


Dancing in Fire

by mackenziebutterschnapps (hannibalsbattlebot)



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Anal Fingering, Angst, Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Death, Comfort Sex, Domestic, Dr. Chilton likes to watch/listen, Drunk Sex, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Everything Hurts, F/M, Fluff, Freddie watches the dogs, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Major Character Injury, Masturbation, Medical Procedures, Mildly Dubious Consent, Multi, One-Sided ChillyWilly, Oral Sex, Porn With Plot, Sexual Content, Shower Sex, Threesome - F/M/M, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Unhealthy Relationships, Vomiting, dark!Will, freddiegram, implied harm to animals
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-09
Updated: 2015-04-13
Packaged: 2018-02-12 11:40:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 18
Words: 55,420
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2108508
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hannibalsbattlebot/pseuds/mackenziebutterschnapps
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Didn't you wonder why Hannibal could smell Freddie on Will so easily? Maybe it wasn't just a simple conversation that they had...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Fire on the Tongue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will visits Freddie while she "plays dead" with the FBI. She wants an apology out of him, but gets more than she bargained for.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> edited 1/22/15 for reasons

Freddie was dead and death was boring.

Sure, staring at the same four walls in an FBI safe house was better than the real death she though was coming for her when Will dragged her out of her car, but only just barely. Here she was, in the center of FBI activity and not allowed to participate, not allowed to write one word. She had been silenced, and what was worse was she had agreed to it.

Jack wouldn't even let her talk to Will. After that first day, when Will sat her down (or more accurately, tied her to a chair in his shed) and explained to her The Plan, she hadn't seen him again. After she agreed, Will gave Freddie over to Jack and washed his hands of her. He hadn't come to see her the whole time she was in hiding, not even to offer an apology.

And she sure as hell deserved an apology.

Her only point of contact was Jack, and Jack was an immovable object between them.

“You need to do you your part while he does his,” Jack said. "Will can't afford to be distracted right now."

She hadn't been a distraction when they wanted her to be part of their plan to catch the Ripper. She hadn't been a distraction when they trotted her out to convince Alana Bloom her boyfriend was a serial killer. She wasn't a distraction when they needed her to write a story to this killer or that killer. She was always so important to them until she wasn't.

Well, Freddie had had enough. The next time Jack came to check in on her, she had her packed suitcase in hand and told him she was leaving.

"It is very important that Hannibal Lecter thinks you're dead right now," Jack said, leaning forward so he could fix her eyes with his and loom over her. "You will jeopardize everyone's safety including your own. You will risk setting the Ripper free to kill again. I know that's not what you want."

Freddie said set down her suitcase. "What I want is to talk to Will Graham, in person."

"I can do that for you," Jack said, stone-faced.

When she confronted Jack, he had, as Freddie predicted, played the bad cop. Now Will could step in to be the good cop. Good cop is the one who goes along to get along and that's just what she wanted. Still, when he showed up, Freddie was actually surprised. She showed him in to the small room and offered to take his coat, but he waved her away.  _Not staying long._

He sat stiffly and talked stiffly.  He looked uncomfortable, as if someone else had dressed him. Put together, and yet rumpled at the same time. She wondered if he had intentionally stood in front of the mirror and tweaked his look until he achieved just the right balance of disheveled and dashing.

"Jack tells me you want to leave protective custody," he said. "That is a very bad idea. Right now, for you, living is over rated."

“I’ll enjoy my resurrection,” she said.

He scoffed at the idea that either of them were survivors. She refused to be drawn into his psychological black hole and made small talk about her career.

"I want you to ask you to do something for me, Freddie," he said, "or rather, don't do something."

He was going to ask her to stay, to not enjoy her resurrection just yet. She wanted him to beg her to stay in the plan. She wanted his gratitude.

 “Don’t write about Abigail Hobbs,” he said.

Freddie was stunned, for the moment, speechless.  She didn't want to talk to him about Abigail. After the surprise came the anger.  _How dare he? What right did he have?_

  Will Graham did not get to control Abigail's legacy after her death.

 He continued, "You can write about me. You can write about Hannibal. But leave Abigail alone."

_Will hates me and loved Abigail, in whatever fashion he is capable of love. Why would he pass this responsibility on now? To me of all people?_

 "You really don't know if you are going to survive him, do you?" she asked.

“Just let her rest in peace,” Will continued.

She felt her stomach turn over with the vertigo of a suddenly shifting perspective. Sitting in this room had been boring, but it had shielded her from the realities of what was happening out there. Her skin crawled as she thought about what the undercover work might really mean. Planning her own death had almost been fun, like a really gritty game of clue, but she didn't have to smile at the devil and have the devil smile back.

Freddie wasn't naïve. She had considered that Will's big plan wouldn't work. Will might end up dead, but she had been thinking of Will Graham Psychopath Wearer of Straitjackets, not the man who sat beside her, scared about his own mortality but still brave. Not too long ago she would have gleefully reported on his hacked up corpse: "How FBI Profiler He Met His Violent End." Where that changed, she didn't know. Maybe it was when she realized she hated Hannibal more and that was something they both had in common.

"I can't promise you I won't write about Abigail," she said. "I have no desire to drag her name through the mud, but what I write or don't write will be determined by my judgment alone.”

 “I’m just trying to protect her, Freddie,” he said patiently. “I  _care_  about her, and so do you. Promise me if they do find her someday, you’ll still be her champion…"

 _Find her. He meant find her body_.  He was thinking ahead to the fall-out of whatever showdown he was going to have with Hannibal. When the police and press started picking into every corner of their lives. Hell, even digging up Hannibal's basement might be enough.

  "I am asking you to be  _loyal_  to Abigail, no matter what. Put her in front of yourself, your career, your  _story_.”

 "I don't need to be told how to treat someone I care about," she said. "I will be loyal to Abigail. I want to be her voice.  But this isn't a promise I'm making to you. This is between me and Abigail I will honor her memory, but I will do it my way."

He stood, jamming his hands into his coat pockets.

"I guess that's the best I can expect from you," he said.

She stood. She wasn't as tall as him, even with her boots on, but she drew herself up as straight as possible. She stepped forward into his personal space, crowding him without touching him. She kept her voice low and steady. "I don't care if you are Special Agent Will Fucking Graham, you do not tell me how to do anything. I am not one of your law enforcement groupies."

He looked away, biting his lip, his expression pinched and narrow. It was only because she was so close that she could hear his tongue click and see the slight stubborn jutting of his jaw. She took the opportunity to run her gaze over his face, knowing that he wasn't looking at her, but he could feel it anyway.

"It must be so frustrating to have someone who doesn't buy your bullshit," she said.

"Your language is unbecoming as a lady and as a wordsmith."

"Is swearing  _rude_?" she asked. "Is it  _terribly rude_  of me?"

He had slipped for just a moment into Hannibal mode. She had seen it and she had called him on it.

"You've made your point," he said, holding up his hands in a gesture that could mean stop or surrender. "I've made mine. I asked you a favor…"

"That you had no right to ask," she said.

"I'm leaving it to you," he said. "I don't have any other choice."

"The lack of control…is just killing you."

"You can get it done, Freddie," he said. "I don't like you very much, but you are stubborn and you are effective. You are the efficient scavenger who will outlive us all"

" Such high praise." She made it sound sarcastic in a way that she didn't feel.  _That’s what he does_ , she reminded herself.  _He’s a profiler who would know exactly how to flatter you to get you to back off._

 “I’m not bullshitting you,” he said. “I might have hated you at first sight, but I  _never_ underestimated you.” 

 "You did threaten to kill me."

"I didn't say I was going to kill you," he said, but couldn't keep a small smile from tugging at the corner of his mouth. "I heavily implied it...and yet you still came out to my remote farmhouse. Aren't you afraid of being alone with me if I’m so dangerous?”

 He had the same look on his face that he had in prison right before he offered her his exclusive story.  _It’s all yours_.  It was a challenge, a vague challenge, but still there.

 “I’m already dead. What more can you do to me?” she said.

Will smiled, a genuine, non-ironic smile. She had seen his glazed detachment, suppressed anger, sardonic half-smirks, but she had never had the opportunity to see his smile. They had never had a moment together nearly this unguarded.

Freddie went through a complicated calculation in her head, lightning fast.   _Turn him_ , an internal voice said.  _You can do it. You have nothing to lose_.

It’s not that Freddie had never pictured this moment, because she had. Maybe not exactly like this, but she pictured herself fucking everyone. It wasn't nymphomania, it was the opposite of that: it was practicality.  If the time came when she thought if she could fellate Dr. Chilton (for example) and have him tell her everything, she had to be ready if the opportunity arose. She couldn't hesitate.  She ran through the scenarios with everyone, ready for whatever might push their buttons. Jack was so in love with his wife, he would something quick and dirty and shameful; Alana Bloom would want to snuggle; Will would last for 3 minutes in missionary and then hate himself afterwards; Will’s lawyer, whose name she couldn't remember, would have been a fun mixture of business and pleasure. He wouldn't tell her much but it would be fun trying. These were the scripts she had written for herself.

But even as she figured out the business angle of it, she wasn't kidding herself that this would be a hardship. Everything else aside, he was not an unattractive man.

She considered and discarded several opening salvos before reaching up and laying her hand flat on his chest. It was a movement open to interpretation, ready for a quick denial.

His hand raised and she had a moment of alarm when she thought he was going for her neck. It would serve her right, she thought, to protect her own skin from several serial killers without any help for so long, only to be throttled by an FBI agent while in an FBI safehouse.

But he wasn't going for her neck. He lifted her chin and kissed her on the mouth, only breaking eye contact at the last moment. She let him kiss her and then pushed him away, gently, then as if reconsidering, pulling him close to her and kissing him back.

This was last-gasp actions, grasping at straws, fumbling for control in a life that was out of control.

Freddie couldn't read his mind, but she didn't have to. She didn't know his thoughts, but his desire was plain. That was good enough for now. She was getting to like how easy these FBI boys were. There was something in all them, not just this one, that was coiled like a spring, bunched up and held down from seeing too much and knowing too much about the evil of people. Once they got a chance to let out the pressure of their own emotions, in a base way they could understand, it all came out.

Brian Zeller may cast her as the villain in his own fantasies, but she barely had to say a word and he told her everything she wanted to know, and more that she didn't. After she let him work off some steam, his muscles unknotted and his face relaxed from the perpetual eyebrow-cock he wore at the crime scenes, he wanted to talk. That is what made him angry with her: not that she had tricked him, but that it had been so easy. He practically walked into the trap on his own.

  She had it too, this tension, but because she chose it, no one ever had sympathy for her. No one would ever tell her to get therapy (that wasn't strictly true; there was one person who suggested it) or fret over her bad dreams.

Sometimes she wanted to bite and scratch and claw at the world. Her brief affairs were all the therapy she needed. They were her emotional vent.

Will kissed her neck, then her collar bone as she unbuttoned his shirt.

“You must have been lonely here in seclusion,” he said.

“Do you think I’m desperate?”

“Lonely? Missing human contact.”

 "What's your excuse then?" she asked.

He paused. "The same."

 

She unbuttoned and unzipped his pants and ran her hand up the outside of his boxers. He was hard under her fingers. He stepped back from her, and she thought for a moment, she had gone too far and he had seen through her plot, but it was just so he could finish taking off his clothes, stripping down to his sad and generic underpants.

 She turned and moved her hair away from her neck.

“A little help,” she said. He unhooked her bra and took it off by sliding down the straps and then scooping his hands under, cupping her breasts with both hands. They pressed against each other.  She broke away from him and peeled off the pants that were so tight they felt like a second skin, and then slid down her panties. Totally naked, she stood in front of him. “If you’re serious, put on a condom. That’s not up for negotiation.”

“Of course,” he said. When she turned and got one from her nightstand, he quickly shed his boxers and jumped under the covers.

“Shy?” she asked.

“No. A little.”

She opened the condom and insisted on helping him put it on, unrolling it down over the shaft slower than was necessary.

“So this is how it’s going to be?” he asked.

She smiled and nodded. He reached up and kissed her again, his other hand pulling her down next to him. They jostled, unsure of where the other intended to be.

“Who’s going to be on top?” he asked.

“Me. Always. Even if I’m on my back.”

He touched her briefly, surprised at how wet she was already. His touch finally got her to close her eyes and lean back. 

No this was not going to be a sacrifice at all.

 

* * *

 

“Turn over” he whispered. He looked at her narrow but unblemished back. He had forgotten there was a world without scars. He kissed her between the shoulder blades and then entered her with a sigh they both shared, harmonious. He was starting to make this a habit since being released from prison, seeking the connection with fellow human beings in a compulsive way he never had before. He had been pulled out into the messy world of personal entanglements and now he couldn't get free.

It wasn't being jailed that caused this change in him. He couldn't fool himself. It was this game--although it was trivializing it to call it a game--that he was playing that made him seek grounding in the physical and carnal. Sometimes he just wished Hannibal would just attack him and release the tension that crackled between them. A good punch across his jaw and the gloves would come off…and then what? He wanted to put his hands on him just so he knew they were both physical beings. They weren't just smoke and light and he could prove it.

He held onto Freddie’s slender hips.  _She was a slim and delicate pig_ said a voice in his head. It was his own voice so drained of emotion it sounded mechanical. He moved his hands up her spine, into her hair. The feel of her hair between his fingers brought back, as vivid as a flashback, yanking a clutch of those curls out by the root. He backed up away from her, sitting back on his heels and holding his hands up as though at gunpoint.

“I can’t,” he said.

 “Oh,” she said simply.

He sat heavily on the side of the bed, and pulled a corner of the sheet over his lap.

She sat down next to him, still unclothed, still as at ease as if she was fully dressed.

“Are you going to put this in your next article about me?” he asked bitterly. “‘My Disappointing Date with A Killer.' You've told the world what I’m capable of. Now you can tell them what I’m not capable of.”

She put a hand on his knee.

“I get it,” she said. “Everything in _your_ life is out of control. _I'm_ desperate to feel alive again. This has mistake written all over it in big neon letters. Let’s just forget it.”

“Its not that,” he said. "Although yes, it is a mistake, writ large, but...

Her interest sharpened and she tried to keep her eagerness in check. “What is it then?”

“I don’t know if I can ever touch you without feeling my hands around your neck,” he said. “I don’t mean that I want to hurt you, because I don’t, but I am remembering that I did hurt you. When I touched your hair the instant memory was pulling a handful of it out of your scalp. If that image doesn't dampen your fire, I hope you don’t hold it against me if it does for me. I’m sorry I hurt you. It had to be that way, but I’m still sorry. And it scares me not that I did it, but that it doesn't bother me more.”

Her apology. Finally. It wasn't as sweet as she expected.

“You probably saved my life, Will,” she said. “You were only doing what you had to do and I respect you for it. And thank you. For the apology."

"It's not that easy to just wave that away and say it didn't matter."

"I'm not," she said. "I was pretty damn afraid, Will. I hate feeling fear. I'm just not going to let fear stop me."

 “Do you know Hannibal enjoyed tasting your fear? He called it astringent with notes of citrus.”

“Son of a bitch." She was surprised at the violence of her own reaction, speaking without thinking. She hugged the sheet to her chest.

He looked at her, finally. When he spoke, his voice was low and tender.

"You didn't know that we ate you?" he said. “Another crime I was complicit in. I helped prepare the meal where you were eaten, allegedly eaten. All the while we were making gallows-humor jokes and I should have wanted to vomit up all the black bile I was swallowing, but I didn't. I didn't even feel the slightest turn of queasiness.”

“It wasn't me," Freddie said firmly. _Who was it, then? Who was it?_ “You  _knew_  it wasn't me. Hannibal thought it was me and he was enjoying it.”

"That is the kind of thing that brings him joy," he said. "After I leave here, I’m going over to his office. We have a date to destroy his patient records together and I will chat with him and drink his wine and eat his  _food_ and I will have to fight with everything I have not to be lulled down into his web all the while not showing a trace of any discomfort on the surface. I’m tired just thinking about it.”

Freddie saw how beaten and tired he looked. Without his new costume he looked more like himself, rumpled and slightly sweaty .

 She couldn't get Hannibal, but maybe Will could. Will suddenly became very important to her. He would be the instrument of her revenge.

She held his face in her hands and kissed him.

“Taste me now. Do I taste like fear?”

 “No,” he said. “You are nothing like your counterfeit. Without your life, your essence, a body is just an empty shell. Nothing more or less than any other cut of meat. The life within you, it animates you from the inside out. It gives you a ferocity than even fire can’t destroy.”

She felt like a fire had been lit inside of her, a burning ember in the center of her chest as familiar to her as her own heartbeat. Her ferocity. The heat that she tamped down until it could look like ice, or stoke until it started to burn.

She kissed him and pulled him down on top of her. He kissed her neck, each breast and down her smooth stomach.

“I want to taste the genuine you,” he said, kissing the tops of both of her pale thighs and then, when she parted her legs for him, the delicate skin of her inner thigh.

If her body was a temple, he approached it like a supplicant, crawling on hands and knees. The symbolism wasn't lost on him. Symbolism was never lost on him. Her pale legs rose like pillars on either side of his head.

He told Hannibal that he did not have a refined palate, but between Freddie’s legs he could taste the sweetness that came from her. She didn't taste like ginger or flowers or wine. She tasted human and alive. He was in a timeless place, registering distantly her moans of pleasure as she achieved climax under his tongue.

She pulled his face up to hers. She could taste herself on his lips. She reached down to guide him inside of her, but he moved his hips away from her and rolled over on his back to lay beside her.

“I can’t have any shadow of a feeling that I’m hurting you. I don’t even want to put my weight on you.”

“I’m not fragile,” she said.

“It isn't that. I know what it is like to touch your body with violence.”

“Feigned violence.”

“The violence was real, even if the reason was an act. I keep holding back, checking myself to make sure,” and then with heartbreaking earnestness he said. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

“Do you want to keep going?”

In response he took her hand and placed on his cock, rocking his hips up to push into her palm so she could feel how hard he was.

“I just want you to be on top. Can you handle that?”

The teasing challenge put them back on familiar ground. Freddie rolled over to fumble in the nightstand for a new condom, the last one lost somewhere in the tangle of sheet pooled on the floor. She took even longer this time, helping him put it on.

“Hey,” he said conversationally, a poor attempt at acting uninterested as she stroked him. “Why do you even have condoms? You are in sequester.”

“I didn't get where I am by being unprepared,” she said. “Jack asked me what I needed and I gave him a list.”

Will leaned up on his elbows.

“You put  _condoms_  on the list and then you gave that list to Jack? You put the list in his hand and between ‘toothbrush’ and ‘contact lens solution’ you wrote condoms?”

“Yes,” she said, her blue eyes open wide the way they were when she was being especially obnoxious. “I even specified the brand.” She used one hand to push him back on to his back.

 “I have to know--what did he say?”

“Absolutely nothing. He knows enough about psychology to know when he’s being baited.”

 “Should I thank Jack Crawford?”

“Please do.”

“Let’s not talk about Jack.”

“Shut up then.”

She straddled him, supporting herself on one hand while the other positioned him. She hesitated.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

“Very okay. Better in a minute.”

She sat back, sliding over him until he was inside her as far as he could be. He breathed through his mouth something a little short of a gasp that turned into a moan that she could feel through the one hand she had on his chest. She rocked her hips very gently, just to see what his reaction would be. He held on to her hips and this time, thought about nothing but how good she felt wrapped around him. He moved one hand and put one thumb into her cleft so when she moved her hips she rubbed against it. Just enough pressure that she had to pursue it, and that she had control over her own pleasure. He felt the shift (somewhere in a distant part of his mind that still worked, no matter what, always worked), where the balance went from a performance, a display for his benefit, to her genuinely chasing her own pleasure. When she achieved her own release it was like a trigger, some barrier moved out of the way and he felt an expansion—in his chest first, that let him take a great open-throated breath—and then lower, the uncoiling of his own orgasm snatching that breath back, just for a moment.

She rolled off him and lay next to him. He reached out to take her hand and, surprising them both, she let him.

Will would have liked to stay there until the room darkened until it was pitch black, all night and into the morning. As soon as he left this room he had to be back on stage. He cleared his throat to break the silence, but Freddie spoke first.

“You need to go soon, don’t you?” she said. “Can’t be late. We can’t have that.”

“Can I use your shower?”

A look passed between them. Hannibal’s sense of smell was the stuff of legends. The story about Jack’s wife had made the rounds. If he could smell cancer, he could smell sex.

She motioned with her hand. The bathroom was all his.

It was in the shower that he made his mistake. He knew, had taught semester after semester, that if someone tries to stage a crime scene, they wind up leaving more clues behind. Will should have remembered that, but he was in a rush. He was thinking, through a post-coital haze, about the time and the message being late would send.

Late would be rude, even if he called. What excuse could he give that would be acceptable? What was more important than their standing appointment?

Instead of looking for and using the tiny hotel bottles of generic shampoo and the raspy, plastic-sealed bar of soap, he used what was already there. Freddie’s shampoo, the exact brand she asked Jack to buy for her. The exact brand she always used because it was the only one that kept her curls from frizzing. He used her soap too, layering one distinct scent with another. He couldn't tell, but to someone with a sensitive nose, he smelled like sex and he smelled like Freddie Lounds. Will couldn't see or smell it, but he was bringing to Dr. Lecter's office a whole picture, not just of what he had been doing this afternoon but what he had been doing for weeks. It was a confession. It was practically gift-wrapped.

Unconscious of all this, obsessed with the time he felt swiftly running out from under him, Will toweled off and quickly got redressed, raking his hands through his hair and then taking a small blob of gel to set it down right. He thought about using Freddie’s toothbrush, but that felt too familiar so he brushed his teeth with his finger.

When he emerged from the bathroom, Freddie was still sitting in bed, still nude, looking like a reigning queen. Although he was the one dressed, he felt exposed.

“I, ah, really have to go,” he said.

“Good luck,” she said. He was halfway to the door, but came back for a good-bye kiss. He wouldn't have been surprised if she decided the moment was over and pushed him away, but she kissed him back.

 

* * *

  

Freddie looked at the door he left through and wondered if she would ever see him again. She wondered how much she wanted to, and why.


	2. Cutting Down

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Freddie visits Will in the hospital, but what does she want?

Freddie was getting nowhere with the nurses. Security was just too tight for her usual techniques. The hospital had celebrity patients in their facility, so the entire staff was on its best behavior. Right now, no one would give Freddie a second glance. In a few days orderlies, security guards and housekeeping staff will have told all their closest friends and family about their thrilling brush with notoriety. After everyone they knew was bored of hearing how they emptied an infamous bedpan, they would be ripe pickings to tell their story to an interested stranger. Maybe then they could even get her access, but for now everyone was vigilant.

Through the first few days, the FBI had released only spare press statements. Injured in the Chandler Circle residence were former special agent Will Graham, Agent Jack Crawford, Dr. Alana Bloom and an unidentified Jane Doe. Jane Doe was dead on the scene and Agent Crawford was pronounced dead at the hospital; Alana and Will remained in critical condition.  The owner of the house and possible suspect in the attack, Dr. Hannibal Lecter, was not found at the scene. It was believed he had fled the country under an assumed identity.

The FBI wouldn’t release the identity of the victim, “pending notification of the family,” but Freddie knew. She had contacted a friendly EMT who let slip that the unknown victim was a young adult female, approximately 20 years of age, brown hair, blue eyes, preexisting facial trauma.

“What does that mean?” Freddie asked him, feeling the familiar tingle at the nape of her neck that meant she was on to something.

“She was missing an ear,” he said.  

Freddie didn’t know how, but Abigail had been alive all this time, hidden away, only to die that night.

She didn’t put that up on Tattlecrime. She didn’t know what it meant yet. She needed to get closer to the investigation. Prurnell was shutting her out. Any promises Jack made died with him and Prurnell refused to honor them.

There was still Will. If she could just get to see Will, he would tell her who was in the kitchen with him that night. His story was all hers.

 

Freddie camped out in the ICU waiting room, hoping to see a familiar face or hear a dropped bit of gossip. When she finally spotted someone she bolted out of the chair.

“Its Jimmy, isn’t it?” she asked the man. “Jimmy Price from the crime lab?”

He looked at her with loathing that was so plain it took her back. She wracked her brain trying to think what she had done to him. She was usually very good at keeping track of who she had pissed off and why.

“How can you show your face here?” he asked. “After what you’ve written about Jack.” It was true. She had written up a piece questioning Jack’s methods and if they played a role in what had happened. On the advice of her attorney she had phrased everything very carefully, but anyone who was familiar with the situation could read between the lines.

“Don’t you have any questions about Agent Crawford’s methods?”

“I’m not discussing that with you right now,” he said, “or ever.”

“What I write, it isn’t personal,” she said. “It’s business.

“You just cut him to ribbons after he protected you.”

“It’s my job. To get to the truth,” she said. She should have stopped there, but maybe it was the phrase Price had used that brought something to mind. “You should understand that. Didn’t you perform Beverly Katz’s autopsy?”

He blanched and then flushed. “Don’t you dare compare what you and I do. I only cut as much as I need to and I do it to help the dead. You cut the living and the dead. You cut on them until there isn’t anything left and you do it to benefit yourself.”

He brushed past her, into the restricted area of the ICU.

 

A few days later, Will was moved out of the ICU so Freddie moved to the waiting room on the fourth floor to try her tricks on a whole new audience. The nurses here had been warned.

“Sorry, family only.” The gatekeeper nurse had her face set in an unpleasant smile.

“But we live together and they won’t tell me anything,” she said, letting a note of helpless desperation crawl into her voice. “I don’t even know where he keeps the checkbook. I can’t even pay the bills. My poor baby. I just want to make sure he’s okay and has everything he needs.”

“I’m sorry,” she said, not looking sorry at all. “No one but family gets in to see Mr. Graham.”

 A voice from behind her said “Are you here to see Will Graham?”

Freddie turned to see a woman, petite but strikingly beautiful, wearing a severe black suit, and wearing it well.

“Yes,” she said, “I have been so worried. I just wanted…”

“You’re Freddie Lounds, from Tattlecrime,” she said, her voice both husky and flat, smoky but world-weary. Her voice was the only thing about her that was broken in. Everything else about her was shiny and immaculate. Her hair fell in long smooth waves and her make-up was meticulous. Most people visiting at a hospital let themselves go in their worry. There were a lot of ponytails and wrinkled t-shirts in the waiting room. The two women were the only ones besides the nurses who didn’t look like they slept in their clothes.

 Freddie didn’t as a rule trust expensive and meticulous exteriors but the brokenness in the other woman’s voice, and her overly shiny eyes told her the external things were barely holding all her broken pieces together.

“I’m sorry, have we met?” Freddie said.

“I’m Margot Verger,” she said. They shook hands, leather glove to leather glove.

It took Freddie only a fraction of a moment to recall the name from her memory. Wealthy family. A meat processing business to give Hormel a run for their money.  The Vergers had been in the news lately because her brother had had an unfortunate accident. He had been paralyzed when he fell into a pig pen.  Rumor had it, he had also been disfigured. As an afterthought, the article mentioned the double hardship for the family.  Margot herself had been injured in an unsolved hit and run and had recently been released from the hospital. The article Freddie read had been simpering, as though Margot would be emptying bedpans herself, which was hardly likely considering how much money they had.

“Will’s mentioned you,” Margot said. “He described you pretty accurately actually.” She looked Freddie up and down, quickly. “He said ‘She makes up for what she lacks in subtlety with brashness and disproportionate confidence. Redhead.’”

That did sound like Will.

 “He said if I could manage to get you added on the visitors’ list, I should.”

She turned to the nurses’ station as she shrugged on her coat. “Loraine. Ms. Lounds is with me, please add her to the list.”

“Of course, Ms Verger,” the gatekeeper nurse said.

“Why would he want me on the list?” Freddie asked.

“He wanted to know if you were safe,” she said “He’ll be happy to see for himself.”

 “Thank you so much,” she said, touching her hand on her chest, the picture of gratitude. “But I did even know you and Will knew each other. You don’t run in the same social circles.”

“Oh, we don’t,” she said and gave a knowing smile . “We met because we had the same psychiatrist.”

 

* * *

 

“Freddie,” Will said when he saw her in the doorway. He gave her a weak half-smile. “You’re okay.”

He looked, very pale and small, lighter by a few pounds, his face more angular.

Freddie sat in the seat to the bedside and pulled it a little closer.

“Sure, I’m okay. I laid low for a little while longer that’s all. I wanted to make sure the coast was clear before I popped my head out.”

“I had no way of knowing,” he said his voice shaky. He cleared his throat. “No one knew where you were. At least, no one I asked would tell me.”

“Well, you never have to worry about me,” she said, leaning back in the chair. “I’m the intelligent scavenger.”

“I was worried that Hannibal got to you,” he said. “His policy was scorched earth. Destroy everything, salt the ground on the way out.” He took a large shaky breath “But I’m glad that you are as well as ever.” He held out his hand to her and she hesitated. She was only planning on getting a few comments, maybe a picture, not sitting bedside holding hands and playing beside nurse.

But, she thought, what would she gain by being unfriendly? This case wasn’t closed. There was always more. _You cut until there isn’t anything left to cut on_ , Jimmy had said to her. _Damn right, I do,_ she thought.

She had developed Will from a source that had been totally hostile to more or less cooperative. She had no one else on the inside of the investigation. Brian and Jimmy Price both hated her, Jack owed her favors she couldn’t cash in, and Alana was in the limbo of a coma.

Freddie slipped off her gloves and held Will’s hand in both of hers.

“Will. Who’s taking care of your dogs?”

“Animal control,” he said bitterly. “Alana did last time, when I was in jail…”

“What about Margot Verger?” Freddie asked stiffly. She wanted to sound just a little jealous.  Freddie needed to know what the connection between them was.  Will Graham would be a long con. But if he had someone else to turn to, he might not turn to Freddie. “Why don’t you have Margot watch your dogs?” she asked.

“We don’t have that kind of relationship,” he said. “We are simultaneously friendly and distant in the way only people who have shared the same trauma can be.”

“What trauma?”

“I can’t tell you about Margot because that isn’t my story to tell.”

 “How do you even know each other? I know you had the same psychiatrist, but I don’t socialize with my dentist’s other patients. They wouldn’t come visit me in the hospital.”

“That isn’t the same and you know it,” he said. “You’ve never had any problem being direct, blunt to the point of what should be embarrassment. Don’t start now. Margot and I aren’t involved, if that’s what you want to ask. We are like survivors of the same shipwreck. Our are lifeboats floating, together, in the darkness. She understands what its like to be gutted. She understands loss.”

“I understand loss,” Freddie said.

“Margot is a friend. That’s all.”

“I can take care of them, the dogs,” Freddie said “but I’ll have to stay at your house. I can’t take seven dogs into a hotel room.”

“Eight,” Will said. “You have to take Applesauce too. Applesauce is Alana’s dog.”

“Okay,” she said with an accommodating smile. “At this point one more dog won’t make much difference.”

“My keys are in the nightstand,” he said.  “I thought you were more of an urban animal. How are you going to get along alone in the middle of nowhere?”

“You don’t know everything about me,” she said.

“Will you be safe? Do you have any police protection?”

“No. All I got from the FBI an injunction barring me from writing about anything about ‘Operation Fish Hook.’ Until further notice I am barred from writing anything I did or saw or was said to me while I was acting in concert with the FBI, starting from the moment I was “killed” on your property, until I was released from protective custody.”

“Aren’t you going to fight it?”

“I did. I already won the right to write about our first interview. Technically, that interview was about Frederick Chilton. My lawyer and I argued that point successfully.”

“What about now? This conversation?”

“Legally allowed. Which is why Prurnell has worked so hard to keep me away from you. But I didn’t come here to get material,” she said. “I came today to get confirmation. Off the record, for my own peace of mind. The FBI says they don’t know the identity of the fourth person in the house that night--”

“They _say_ ,” he said dismissively. “They say that, but they know. Prurnell knows because I told her. It was Abigail.”

Freddie thought she had been prepared for the news but it hit her like a fist in the chest.

“Are you going to put that on Tattlecrime or is this just something you needed to know?”

“I just needed to know,” she said. She was surprised she had the breath to speak.

Will squeezed her hand.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry I couldn’t save her.”

The tears that came up in her eyes were real, but she didn’t have to hide them.

“You don’t think I can feel these things but I can. No matter what you think of me, I’m still human. You were right when you said Abigail reminded me a little of myself.  She did and I wanted to help her.”

“The way no one helped you.”

He was profiling her. _Don’t get angry,_ she told herself. _We are having a moment of connection. This is good_.

“I wish I could have talked to her just once,” Freddie said. “I wonder what might have been different if I had been there.”

“Hannibal would have killed you,” he said flatly, “and nothing would have changed.”

“Why didn’t he kill you?”

“Because he wanted me to hurt,” he said. “He wanted me to feel the depth of my own failure. I tried to catch him and I failed. And he’s right. I knew I was putting everyone in danger, but I thought I could beat him. I tried my best, but I was beaten, and beaten worse than I could have imagined because I lived. He didn’t even give me the satisfaction of knowing I did everything I could. I lived when others didn’t.

 “When I first regained consciousness in the hospital, I was so disappointed.  I asked the doctors why they didn’t just let me die? They asked me if I wanted to talk to anyone about my suicidal ideations. They wanted me to talk to a _counselor_. They have no idea what they are fucking doing. Greater minds than the psychiatric attending at this hospital have tried to impose order on my disorder. I don’t _want_ or _need_ another therapist in my life.”

She couldn’t agree or disagree. She didn’t know what he needed. That thing might not exist.

“If you died there would be no hope of catching him.”

“I don’t want to. I want him to have killed me. It won’t really end until one of us is dead. Let it be me.”

“Why not him?”

There was a long pause.

“ _Because he still has something to live for!_ He has a zest for life that I don’t have. I don’t have _anything_ to live for anymore! _I don’t have anything to live for!”_

A nurse popped her head in and Freddie waved her away.

He wrapped his arms around his stomach. The yelling itself was physically painful.

“Why would he save her for me just to kill her again? _Why?_ ”

The next thing he said gave her chills.

“Why did he have to kill her? I would have gone with him if I knew!”

The nurse came back in with two other nurses, one was Loraine, and the other was Amazonian, well over six feet tall, with a kind face. She was obviously called in to be the muscle. The first nurse, the one who looked in, had a syringe. Will took in the scene at a glance. Freddie wondered how often they came to visit him like this.

“Don’t drug me! Don’t give me that unless it is enough to stop my heart. I don’t want to sleep!”

“He doesn’t want it,” Freddie said weakly.

“We have standing orders to sedate Mr. Graham if he is agitated. It’s either this or physical restraints.”

The Amazonian nurse was sitting across his legs and had his left arm pinned. Loraine was struggling with his right. He yelped sharply. This could not be good for his wound.

“You are hurting him.”

“He’ll be relaxed in a moment.”

“I don’t want it! I don’t want to be drugged! I refuse! I decline medical treatment!”

“Can you stop? He doesn’t want it.”

“Who are you?” the first nurse asked. “Are you family?”

“I’m his girlfriend. Live-in. And I’m making the medical decisions now. No shots.”

“Do you have power of attorney?”

“Yes,” Freddie said.

The nurse with the syringe looked at Loraine, who shook her head.

“We don’t have any record of that,” Loraine said, and she nodded at the first nurse who pushed the plunger down on the syringe.

For the first time since the struggle began Will looked over at Freddie.

“Don’t let them…”

She took his left hand away from the Amazonian and stroked his forearm.

“I’m so sorry,” she said.

His eyes were going already going glassy and unfocused. A tear slid out from the corner of one eye.

Freddie turned on the nurses. “Do you know how much he has been drugged against his will?”

“We have standing orders from the doctor,” said First Nurse.

“This is sadistic and borders on malpractice. What are your names? I already know you, _Loraine_ ,” she said icily. “But who are you?”

“That’s Donna,” said the Amazonian.

“Thank _you_ ” Freddie said. “Now leave. All of you.”

They left, briskly.

Whatever they gave him was strong, but he was fighting it. His eyelids fluttered up and down. She sat on the bed, stroking his arm, and then his face. He probably wouldn’t remember her touch, she thought, but it would help him now.

“Shh,” she said, touching his face. His eyes flew open in panic. His free hand scratched at the hand on his face.

“Don’t!” he said, and started to make choking sounds. She was about to find a (different) nurse, when he finally lost consciousness and stopped struggling. She couldn’t call it sleep, seeing the way he fought it. There was nothing restful about it. She couldn’t begin to imagine what dreams he sunk down into.

 

Freddie had planned to leave as soon as he lost consciousness, but she stayed, standing guard against the nurses and their syringes. Will wanted to be sharp and alert, even if that meant being in pain. She could understand that. It was just what she would want, if she were the one in the hospital bed.  He started to stir a few hours later, calling for her sleepily.

“Freddie?” he said “D’you have your camera with you?” His voice was slow and labored, the drug still working on him.

“Of course,” she said “I always have a camera.”

He pulled up the front of his hospital gown. He couldn’t lean over to catch the hem so he took a pinch of fabric in each hand and walked it up by gathering it up into his fists with his fingers. The gown rose like a curtain first on a small strip of unharmed flesh and then the wound. It was jagged and ugly, not yet healed into a scar. The two halves were held together with vertical strips of surgical tape and there was a drainage tube leading out of his side, the other end lost somewhere in the sheets. Pinkish fluid had collected in the tube.

“Take your shot,” he said.

She didn’t say no, but she didn’t go for her camera.

 “Exclusive photos,” Will said. “No one else has a picture of one of the victims. I told you, it’s all yours.”

She took out her camera. Through the lens she had seen much worse. The lens had the ability to shrink and contain whatever she was looking at. The image was manageable, and boxed in when looked at the right way.

“Close your eyes and lay back,” she said. “When Prurnell sees these I want it to look like you are sleeping. You don’t need to be complicit in this.”

“I don’t care.”

“You might later.”

She pried the hem of the gown from his fists and arranged it and the sheet to look casually rumpled. When it looked enough like it had just rucked up on its own while he slept, she stepped back and focused the camera again. He took a breath and when he let it out he went lax. He wasn’t sleeping again, but he was somewhere else.

She took the pictures, changed her position and took more. Close-ups and wide shots. His wound was just a thin line in her camera. Just a thread.

“Done,” she said, popping the camera back into her bag and shutting it with a click.

“Did you get the shot?”

“Yes. Thank you,” she said.

“I wanted to give you something you could use.”

“I know,” she said. She hesitated, then leaned over and gave him a kiss on the forehead, then smoothed down his gown and rearranged his sheet neatly over him. He was groggy, but awake enough now to protest if the nurses tried to give him anything else.

She had to get out of here. She took his house keys with her and called animal control on her way out of the parking lot. At least for the next couple of days, home base would be Wolf Trap, Virginia.


	3. Housekeeping

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Freddie dog-sits, but eventually Will is going to be released from the hospital. She has to decide what her next move is going to be.

It had been nearly three weeks since Freddie had been able to see Will. Her little stunt with the photograph had gotten her barred from the hospital grounds.  She didn't want to try to contact Will directly, so sent an e-mail to Margot Verger to ask her to tell Will why she couldn’t visit. She got one response, an e-mail that read, in its entirety “I’ll let him know,” and then, nothing.

No one knew she was here at his house. She had no visitors. She usually liked the hustle of a motel on the main strip, but this was like taking a vacation. Didn’t writers go into cabins in the woods to shut themselves off to work on their books? This was something like that. It was restful, but it felt like her life was still on hold. She was on her way to coming back to life, but not quite there yet. But she figured if she was being reincarnated she might want to stop before being reborn to enjoy the peaceful seclusion of the womb.

 

* * * 

 

The dogs were really a great security system, but since no one had come out to the house until then, Freddie hadn’t seen it in action. The whole pack was at the door whimpering and shifting from paw to paw before she even heard the tires on the gravel. She even had time to put on her coat and boots before the visitor got out of his car. Despite the assurances that Hannibal Lecter wasn’t even on this continent, she was armed as usual. Just in case.

The visitor did drive a nice car and was well dressed, but it wasn’t the man Freddie feared it would be. She watched him checking himself over, jingling his keys in his hand, then he reached into the car, stretching over the seat for something. When he straightened and turned she saw it was Leonard Braver, Will’s attorney, holding a glass vase of tiger lilies.

When he saw her, standing there and watching him arms crossed across her chest, he brought himself up short, but then he covered it well, walking towards her smoothly and holding out the flowers.

“I guess these are for you, Ms. Lounds, ” he said.

She looked at them and made no movement to take them

“Some lazy delivery boy left them by the mailbox,” he said. Like many places out in the country, the mailboxes for all the houses along the road were clumped up at the intersection of the main road. “I thought I would bring them up since I was coming this way.”

Freddie took the flowers but didn't say anything, waiting for Braver to talk.

“I was looking for Will Graham. Is he here?”

“He’s still in the hospital,” she said. “You should check there.”

“This is his house, though. Right?”

“Yes.”

“So, what are you doing here?” he asked. It was an accusatory question, something he did all the time in court. The pointed inquiry that implies more than it asks.

“I live here,” she said.

“Since when?” he asked.

“I don’t think that’s any of your business, Mr. Braver,” she said.

“It is my business to protect my client’s privacy and property.”

“Is Will your client again? He’s paid you a retainer?”

He pursed his lips and huffed impatiently.

“Listen, you aren't supposed to be here. You can tell your story to the cops, when they haul you out of here” he said, taking his phone out.  He had a cloud of superiority around him, even outside the courtroom.

“Will gave me the keys,” she said. “I have his permission to be here.”

“He asked you to house-sit? I’m having a hard time buying this.”

“House-sit, dog-sit. Someone has to.”

“And he asked you?" Braver asked, incredulous and mocking. "No offense, Ms. Lounds, but he fucking hates you.”

“During the trial, I’m sure he did. The feeling was mutual. But that was when I thought he killed Abigail Hobbs and now we both know he didn't. That changes things.”

“You still testified against him.”

She pinned him with a level look “And you questioned my integrity, but I don’t hate you. I know the difference between personal and professional.”

A small smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. Freddie could see the spark in his eyes that was equal parts anger and interest. “I questioned your integrity because you lied. You have a history of lying and you lied on the stand. I don’t believe Abigail Hobbs ever said she was afraid of Will Graham.”

“You already have a fixed idea about my testimony. I’m not going to argue it with you.”

“If he’s so dangerous then what are you doing here?”

“I am done talking to you, Mr. Braver.”

She turned to go back in the house. Braver moved quickly to position himself between her and the door.

“If Will is here, I want to see him. Now,” Braver said.

“He isn't, but since I’m not going to let you inside, you’ll just have to take my word for it.”

He looked at the phone in his hand.

“You can call the police, Mr. Braver,” she said.

He put the phone in his pocket, giving her a look that said _just this once._

 “Can I give you my card to give to Will when he gets in?”

She shrugged again, but didn't hold out her hand.

“Your friend needs legal representation. While he’s been recuperating the FBI Special Investigators have been working up a nice case against him.”

“Regarding what?”

Braver was too savvy to answer. “That is a confidential matter.”

 “Can I quote you on that?” she asked. “That the FBI is planning to charge Will Graham with a crime? How long, do you think, until charges are filed?”

He shook his head. “You are a real piece of work, you know that?”

He turned, slotted his business card in the bouquet of flowers Freddie still held.

“Go ahead and publish anything you want, Ms. Lounds,” he said. “Quote me however you like. I will sue your ass so fast you’ll wish you stuck to writing about cancer miracle cures. I’ll be your lucky number seven slander suit.”

 

 * * *

 

Once Braver was gone. Freddie contemplated the flowers she held. There was a card with it that said “To: FL , From: WG” and in the space left for the message, it simply said, in some shop assistant’s handwriting “Housewarming.” Freddie even flipped over the card to see if there was anything else, but there wasn't.

The bouquet was so simple she should be offended: a handful of tiger lilies and nothing else, stuck in a plain glass vase. Was this supposed to be charming? It was if he didn't even try.

She put them on the kitchen table, noticing the spiky shapes they made against the gloom of the kitchen. The splash of color stood out against the walls. They were the brightest thing in the room.

She looked at the card again, the start one-word message.

 _If you aren't going to put any effort into a gesture, why even bother?_  she though, _but yet…_

If Will really didn't care, she wouldn't have gotten this. She would have wound up with carnations in a rainbow coffee mug. If he didn't care at all, Will would have called up the florist, told them what price he wanted to pay and then told them he didn't care what it looked like.  To order _this_ bouquet, he would have had to fight the florist who would have insisted on adding some greenery at least. Baby’s breath and ferns. She could almost hear Will calling them “insipid” and patiently saying “I understand it’s free but I want you to leave it out.” No ferns, not even a ribbon for the vase, no sappy sayings for the card. This was calculated to look off-hand, even thoughtless, but a lot of thought had gone into this simple bouquet.

Freddie didn't like that he was making guesses about her. She liked even less that they were right.  The bouquet was just what she would have wanted, if she had sat down to think about it. Only she never did sit down and think what her favorite flower was. Will Graham had figured it out before she had and the thought rankled her. She threw them away, vase and all, right into the trash.  When she walked the dogs that night she took the bag of kitchen trash out to the garbage can, even though it was barely half full, as if it contained something too toxic to be left inside overnight.

 

* * *

 

When she heard a car coming up the drive a few days later, she thought it was Braver coming back. When she stepped out on the porch she saw it was a taxi. Through the car’s back window, she could see Will’s ghost-like face, pale and smudged with shadow. She watched him get out of the car and then went out on to the path to meet him. He had a white plastic bag with him and he shivered, coatless, in the cold.

He was walking carefully. She could see he was in pain by the stiff way he was holding his upper body and shoulders, but he was taking care to hide it.

“That must have been an expensive cab ride,” she said. “Why did you take a taxi?”

“It wasn't too bad,” he said.

“I would have picked you up.”

 “I didn't want to presume I could impose on your time,” he said. “I didn't know we had the ‘call-me-for-ride’ kind of relationship.”

“We have the ‘watch-my-dogs, here-are-my-keys’ kind of relationship.”

“That’s true,” he said. “Thanks for that.”

Here it was. She could just hand him back his keys back and take off. They could go back to being each other’s nemesis. It would be the easier thing to do. She walked up, keys in hand. Instead she held the keys tight in her fist and gave Will a hug.

“I’m so glad you are okay,” she said.

At first he held his arms out away from her, surprised and unsure. Then he dropped his bag in the snow and hugged her back.

“Thanks,” he whispered. “Careful. I’m still a little tender.”

She pulled back and laid a hand on his shirt front, over where his wound was, just for a second.

“I forgot,” she said.

She picked up his bag and they walked into the house together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Semi-fluffy set-up for future events. I've been trying to make my chapters shorter and more digestible.


	4. Teeth in a Soft Mouth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Now that Will is out of the hospital, he and Freddie define the boundaries of their relationship--both professional and personal.

While Will took a shower, Freddie heated up some soup she had made the other day. It wasn’t fancy, but it was vegetarian, something she thought he might appreciate.

 

He looked revived after his shower, his skin flushed.

 

“Are you cooking?” he asked.

 

“When you are a vegetarian you have to cook or sometimes you don’t eat,” she said. “Are you a vegetarian?”

 

“I very well may be.”

 

He peeked over her shoulder into the pot and looked at the contents with disdain.

 

“Alphabet soup? Were they out of strained peas?” he said. “I’m not a child.”

 

_You’re acting like one_ , she thought.

 

“It was the littlest noodle they had at the store,” she said. “You don’t have to read something into everything. Not everything means something.”

 

“So giving me a home-cooked meal just like momma used to make wasn't a calculated attempt on your part to infantilize me and make me internalize some pseudo-parent/child dependence on you?” he said, sitting down at the kitchen table.

 

“I know better than that,” she said serenely, tapping the spoon on the side of the pot. “That would only work if a hot bowl of homemade soup reminded you of home. Your mother never made you soup. Neither did mine.”

 

One of Freddie's favorite tricks was to appear vulnerable by admitting something personal the other person knew already.  It worked best with things that were “shameful” or embarrassing because they didn't bother her, but the hearer often felt embarrassed on her behalf. _Mommy was never around enough to make me soup. Boo-hoo._

“Are we going to bond over our substandard childhoods?” Will asked.

 

“I wasn't planning on it,” she said. “But since you’re the patient, you set the agenda.”

 

He leaned forward on his elbows, suddenly sharp “How is this for an agenda? You tell me what your agenda is. We said a lot of things, did a lot of things, when I thought I was a dead man. I don’t know how much was genuine, from either of us. So let’s at least be honest about our intentions.”

 

Freddie put a bowl of soup down in front of Will, which he ignored, and then sat across from him and spoke. “I’ll lay all my cards on the table. I want us to work on writing your story together, like I was doing with Abigail. You will get the same deal she was: I tell your story. Any suspicions I might have about what you might be leaving out or changing to make yourself look better, they don’t make it into the book.”

 

“Why would I change my story?”

 

“Leonard Braver was here, saying you might need representation. He said the FBI is looking into filing charges against you.”

 

“I know that. I already have a team of excellent lawyers who have been working hard so I was allowed to walk out of that hospital instead of being taken to jail.”

 

“That might be a good example of where you might not want me to dig any deeper.”

 

“What do you get out of this?” he asked.

 

“The inside scoop about Dr. Lecter," she said. "I live here and we collaborate together. You give me just as much information as I need to keep the public interested in the story until I can get the book out. ”

 

“That is the professional side of our relationship. I don’t see why you would need to live together, unless we were going to have a personal relationship as well.” She was staring at him in a way that was both icy and innocent, the look of the popular high school girl who wore a purity ring but would cut people down with a well-placed insult as quickly as breathing.

 

 He broke eye contact with her and ran his hands through his almost-dried hair. “This is awkward.”

 

“Don’t be a blushing schoolgirl,” she said. “If you want me to treat you like an adult, I will. I don’t like you as a person but I enjoyed sleeping with you and I’d like to do it again. Your endearing stammering makes me think you feel the same way.”

 

“Your bluntness has its upsides,” he said.  “But doesn't it take all the mystery out of a relationship if we've both done thorough background checks on each other? It isn't very romantic.”

 

“I thought you would have had enough of romance and mystery,” she said. “I’m not the love of your life. I’m the rebound from the love of your life.”

 

“Forget what I just said about liking your bluntness,” he said.

 

“Do you want honesty or do you want to be babied?”

 

“You can be honest without going for the jugular every time, Freddie. You just don’t know how to do things in half measures do you?” he said. “A personal relationship, even a casual one, calls for a certain gentleness and consideration for the other person. Can we be gentle with each other? Can we be more than snarls and bared teeth?”

 

“There is a time and a place for teeth,” she said, and he smiled.

 

"Now is good," he said.

 

Will had only been home from the hospital for a few hours, but the soup was forgotten as they were tearing their clothes off. One of them would regret this, but it wouldn't be her. She had a taste for the tawdry. She would pick a motel over a hotel any day. In her opinion, it didn't take much effort to look like a queen sitting on a throne, but it did take talent to look like a queen while sitting on a mound of trash. She surrounded herself with trash, both literal and figurative: seedy motel rooms in sketchy neighborhoods, sources on the make, unsuitable lovers. It was a personal challenge to see how much she could dive into and shake off like water from a duck’s back.

 

 After taking a moment to shoo the overexcited dogs outside, Will made some vague, growling threat to fuck her into the mattress, which turned out to be physically impossible for him at this stage of his recovery. She suggested they take turns: she would fuck him into the mattress this time and next time would be his turn.

 

“Look at us, already working together,” he said, as he settled himself in the most comfortable position on the bed. She kissed him on the neck and mouth and stroked him until he was fully hard again. Taking care not to put any weight on his stomach, she straddled him and, very slowly, lowered herself down on him.

 

“aaaaaaaAAAAAAAHHHHH!!!”

 

An exhale of relaxed pleasure became a wail of pain as she slid down on him. She had been careful in how she lined up her body with his, avoiding putting any pressure or even touching his stomach. There shouldn't have been any pain.

 

“What’s wrong?”

 

“My incision!. Fuck that hurts!”

 

“I’m not even near it,” she said.

 

“Well something is pulling on it,” he said, panting. “Scar tissue or something. Fuck! I feel like I’m going to burst at my weakest seam—no, don’t move! The pain is just starting to ease. If you move now it will be like waking the beast.”

 

She sat on top of him, thighs trembling as she tried to bear as much of her own weight as she could. Seconds passed.

 

“Is this tantric sex?” she asked.

 

“No,” he said. “Okay you can move now. I think it will be okay.”

 

“Move? Like this or…”

 

“No! Get off! Quick. Like tearing off a band-aid.”

 

She threw herself off of him to the right side, momentum nearly rolling her onto the floor.

 

He reached out a hand to steady her. “Careful,” he said.

 

He turned on his side and pulled her close, so they were spooning, her back to him. He nuzzled her neck

“You will have to be more gentle with me than I thought,” he said.

 

His touch was tender and as it moved over her, every nerve was aware of his light almost feathery touch. He touched her breasts, but not just her breasts. He skimmed over them and came back.  Although his touch was unhurried and relaxed, he was still excited and from time to time moved his erection along the cleft of her ass with small hip movements.  She parted her legs enough for him to enter her, which he did slowly.

 

She hadn't planned for this slow Sunday-morning feeling. With his arm draped over her and the length of his body pressed along hers, this was too close to lovemaking than the fucking she was planning. But she didn't deny herself experiences just for the virtue of being without it. That was puritanical and counter to everything she led her life by.

 

They didn't speak, didn't make sounds other than breathing. They communicated through touch and through breath. She knew he was close to finishing just by the rhythm of his breath on her neck. At the last moment he kissed her ear and held her earlobe gently between his teeth. Not a bite, just a hold, another way of telling her how gentle he could be, how much control he had over his own actions. The past few months had taught him control. He could show his teeth and not bite. Even as he came the grip on her earlobe didn't tighten, although she could feel and hear his breath speed up.

 

After he came he pulled out and away from her, but only as far as he had to to plant soft kisses down her spine. She started to turn to lay flat on her stomach, but he stopped her with a hand on her hip and turned her the other way, on to her back. She remembered the gentle teasing of her earlobe and eagerly spread open her legs so he could kiss her there.  She was dripping wet, a trickle of his come leaking out of her. She felt it, and then his tongue tracing the same path up.

 

She wondered what they tasted like together, whether they harmonized on a basic chemical level.

 

_You’re getting to be just as bad as he is_ , she thought.   _Poetic bullshit_.

 

He was just as slow with his tongue as he had been with his cock and it kept her just on the edge of climax.

 

“Faster,” she said. “More.”

 

He had been waiting for her to ask. He sped up with rhythm and her release moved over her in sweet slow waves. He picked up his head and ran his tongue over his glazed lips then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, not with any distaste, but with the expression of a man who has finished a pleasing meal and just pushed back from the table. He lay back down next to her. She put her head on his chest and her hand rested safely up and away from his wound.

 

She was sated and sleepy, dreamily content. His voice pulled her from the edge of sleep. Some time had passed. She could tell because the light in the room had passed from golden twilight to full murky evening. He was wakeful and it had made her wakeful.

 

“I have to tell you something,” he said. “about Margot.”

 

“Mm-mm”

 

“At the risk of padding your ego--your instincts about her were right. Margot and I were involved, briefly.”

 

“Involved how?”

 

“Physically involved,” he said. “We slept together once.”

 

“I didn't think she liked men,” Freddie said.

 

“How would you know?”

 

“I don’t deal in society gossip, but that doesn't mean I don’t hear it.”

 

“She wasn't so much interested in me as what I could offer her,” he said. “She wanted to have a baby, but she miscarried when she had her car accident. “

 

“Are you going to try again?” she asked. “Is that why you two stay friendly? I could see how being a sperm donor to that family might be very lucrative.”

 

“This was no financial transaction; money paid for services rendered," Will said. “No, we aren't going to try again. _We_ didn't try the first time. _She_ decided to get pregnant and _I_ was informed after the fact. She wanted the baby and I was a means to that end. She told me in no uncertain terms. I could be part of the child’s life if I wanted, no hard feelings if I didn't. She called the male influence optional in child-rearing.”

 

“Would you have been part of the child’s life?” Freddie asked. “Is that something you were interested in? Being a father?” 

 

“The timing was bad, and I would have liked to have a choice beforehand. I don’t know. I was mad at first, but I got used to the idea. Pretty quickly, actually,” he said. “We’re friendly now that the slate has been wiped clean. What I told you about being survivors is the truth. We met through our therapist. She told me she was pregnant right in Hannibal’s office with him smiling his unsmile like a proud matchmaker. They both used me, but she at least feels bad about it. That’s why she’s paying for my lawyers.”

 

Will resettled in the bed, his voice starting to sound sleepy again. “Tomorrow we can write up something you can publish about me getting representation. Not tonight.”

 

Freddie wasn't going to be so easily put off. "Margot tricked you into getting her pregnant? How?"

 

“It’s a stupidly common story. She told me she was on birth control and I believed her. ”

 

Freddie thought about Will as a father. He would mean well, but he would be a shitty dad. He did fine with the dogs, but didn't have his act together enough to nurture another human. He was dangerous because he didn't know that about himself yet. Not even failing with his adopted daughter taught him a lesson about his own limitations. He had a romantic view of children as tiny people who looked up to you and would love you unconditionally.    

 

“Will," Freddie said, "you didn't ask _me_ if I was on birth control.”

 

“Are you?”

 

“No,” she said. She let the silence stretch and waited for the follow-up question that didn't come. “I had my tubes tied years ago.”

 

“That’s good,” he said, and turned his face away from her on the pillow. He would have liked her to think he had fallen asleep.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Note: the chapter's name comes from the term “soft mouth,” used in dog breeding to describe the ability of a dog to hold quarry in its mouth without biting it)


	5. A Surprise Invitation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will is down in the dumps and Freddie decides to cheer him up by bringing over a special guest.
> 
> Setting events up for a dinner party among friends that does not end in bloodshed.

Freddie and Will’s days together followed the same basic routine. They started the day out all business and got friendlier and more casual as the day went on. In the morning, Freddie interviewed Will, then they went their separate ways. In the afternoon she took her laptop into the upstairs bedroom and wrote and Will had that ‘alone time’ he needed. Once the sun set, work stopped. Freddie took off her journalist hat and they were friends, fixing and eating dinner together, walking the dogs and talking (off the record). By night time they were lovers. They started again the next morning as work colleagues.

 It was tough work for Freddie. Will was giving her dry biographical information about himself, things she already knew. He was sharing weird and amusing--but impersonal--anecdotes from his time as a police officer. Whenever the conversation got too close to something he didn't want to talk about, he swerved away from it. Freddie didn't want to push him too hard, but she was getting frustrated at the lack of progress she was making.

 This went on for two weeks, and then something changed. Will cancelled their morning meeting by not showing up at the kitchen table where they held their work sessions.  He had gone fishing at dawn and came back after dusk. He cleaned and cooked the fish himself without saying a word to Freddie.

 “I guess you are eating meat again,” she said.

 “Yeah,” he said. “Fish is safe enough.”

 “You didn’t go fishing just to have something to eat.”

 He paused with the knife in the air. “I think I need a break from talking about my past for a little while,” he said.

 For the next few days, Will spent his time the day either walking the woods with one of the dogs, or sitting behind a locked door in the other upstairs bedroom. Freddie was not above literally spying through key holes, so she knew he didn't read or even sleep in there. He just stared at the wall and brooded.  He was avoiding her as much as possible for two people who live in the same house.

 Freddie briefly considered confronting him, but she wasn't his mother or his therapist or really even his girlfriend. She decided to put this downtime to good use and work on some other things.  She woke up, alone, and dressed in her work clothes: skintight pants and a high-necked snake-skin printed shirt.  

Will actually came out of the bedroom while she was making coffee. He was wearing an ensemble of sweatpants and a stretched and faded tee shirt.It looked like the same thing he wore the day before. Freddie wondered if he just put on whatever was closest when he got out of bed or if he just slept in his clothes.

Will sloshed some coffee in a mug and sat at the table.

 “Are you going somewhere?” he asked Freddie.

“I have some things I need to do,” she said. “Since we are taking a break in our work, I’m going to run up to Baltimore today.”

“Can’t you work from home?"

_Home._

“Not today. I have to track down some police reports. They are public records but they are making it a real pain in the ass to get them. I might have to go down to the PD. Who knows how long they’ll make me wait,” she said.  “You can come with me.”

 “I don’t want to go to _Baltimore_.” He scowled.

He had been out of the hospital for nearly three weeks and didn't want to go anywhere, not even to the grocery store. Baltimore was out of the question. With her gone all day, he might not even move from the couch for hours.

“How about we make a deal,” she said. “You stay here and take a shower, maybe clean up a little and I’ll bring you home a surprise from Baltimore.”

He looked at her skeptically.

“You’ll like it,” she said.

 

As soon as Freddie turned her car out on to the main road, she took out her phone. When the line was picked up, she identified herself to the voice on the other end.

“No comment,” he said sourly.

“I didn't ask you anything yet,” she said.

On the other end, Dr. Frederick Chilton took a long dramatic breath.

“Ms. Lounds, how did you even get my personal number?”

“It’s not a state secret, Dr. Chilton, you had it on your business cards.”

“That was for patients who needed to reach me after hours, not for the so-called press to bother me. You know I am not in a position to give you access to anyone at the state hospital right now, so it’s no use even asking. Whatever pull I still have in that building I’m not going to waste helping you.”

“I’m not asking for access, I’m offering it.”

She could sense she had his attention. “Go on.”

“Will Graham,” she said.

“What about him?”

“He’s out of the hospital now.”

“Glad to hear he is on his way to recovering full health.”

“Physical health, yes, but what about his mental health?” Freddie tapped her gloved fingers on the steering wheel.

“He’s been through a traumatic event,” Chilton continued slowly, “and therapy would probably be beneficial. Without seeing him I can’t make a diagnosis, but PTSD would not be an unusual finding in this situation. That is on top of whatever psychological conditions he had to begin with--but I would guess that he would be reluctant to enter into another patient-therapist relationship, considering his unfortunate experience with psychiatry.”

“He has had some terrible therapists lately,” Freddie said.

“And I was one of them, I’ll admit,” he said, “although that was more due to the fact that my patient and my colleague were using me to play mental footsie with each other.”

“That’s why I’m suggesting just a friendly visit.”

“Did Will Graham ask you to call me up? Because, excuse me for being paranoid, but that sounds like a trap.”

“It’s my idea. He doesn't know anything about it.”

“So you say. Firstly, I don’t understand what you would want me to do and secondly why you are even involved. What’s your angle?”

“No angle, just basic human compassion.” Chilton made a scoffing noise “I’ve been out to see Will, and he’s not doing so well.”

“Maybe he just wants you to leave him alone. You are very _persistent_ , Ms. Lounds. It can be very annoying.”

“He needs some friends around him. And since he doesn’t really have any friends, you and I will have to do.”

“Excuse me if I’m not wholly sympathetic to his plight. Will Graham doesn't have any friends because his other little friend keeps killing all of them off.”

 _“His_ little friend? Not _your_ friend?”

“Hannibal is not my friend. He was, at one time, a colleague. However, he set me up to be the patsy for his murders. He got me shot in the head. That conclusively ended any personal or professional relationship we may have had.”

“You and Will have that complaint in common. Who knows what he might disclose to you as a fellow victim of Dr. Lecter.”  She switched the phone to her other ear. “Look, Frederick, I've been on your side through the  Ripper investigation. I found exonerating evidence--”

“--that I was an incompetent surgeon. Thank you very much. It was such a treat to read about my former colleagues trashing me. As if my reputation hadn't taken enough of a beating, you come along to kick that dead horse.”

“I think you owe me a small favor. As much as you complain about your missing organs, you are still alive and you owe some of the thanks to me. When Abel Gideon performed his surgery on you, I pumped air into your lungs so you wouldn't die until help arrived. I’m just asking you to socialize—with someone you want to know better any way. Will Graham may not be the Ripper, but he’s still a psychological unicorn.”

“When I asked him to help me he turned me in to Jack!”

“And probably saved your life,” she said. “Really, do you have anything better to do tonight?”

He sighed. When he spoke again, the acid was gone from his voice.

“I’ll go. In an unofficial capacity only. And I’ll only go if you go too. I’m not going out to the cabin in the woods alone. That place gives me the creeps. I don't exactly have fond memories of the place. The last time I was there I had to use dog shampoo to wash blood out of my hair.”

“Fine,” she said. “It’s a bit of a drive, so pack an overnight bag.”

“ That should be cozy,” he said. “You’ll have to drive me. _I_ can’t drive. I don’t know if you remember, but I lost my sight in one eye, and with it my right to drive in the state of Maryland.”

“Okay. I can drive you but I have to make a few stops on the way.” They would need alcohol if they had any chance of making this party a success.


	6. Uno, Dos, Tres

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Continuation of game night at the Graham/Lounds household. Games are played, beers are consumed, dick jokes are made. Starts out fun but ends sad. Sorry.

Will opened the door and smiled to see Freddie was back and then the smile changed to a confused frown.

“Freddie…Frederick. What are you doing here?” His confused gaze bounced between them.

Freddie was glad to see that Will had picked up some of the mess in the main room, taken a shower and changed out of his sweatpants.

“It’s a surprise welcome home party,” she said. She held up the plastic bags she had in each hand “I brought food and booze, and a guest. And I’m definitely going to drink so we’re staying overnight.”

“Freddie, I cleaned up around here and I’m exhausted…” he said, but he was talking to her back as she walked to the kitchen. He turned and was face to face with Frederick.

“Come on in,” he said. “You’re looking…well.”

“Like hell I am. I have your fashion-forward friend to thank for this accessory.” He gestured at the eyepatch. “I’m like the world’s worst Jack Sparrow impersonator.”

“Jack Sparrow… didn’t have an eyepatch.”

“I said ‘worst’ didn’t I?”

“And Hannibal didn’t shoot you.”

“Oh, Hannibal shot me all right, he just used an unconventional weapon. I don’t blame Miriam Lass for what happened, not for one red hot minute.”

When Frederick walked past him into the house Will muttered under his breath. _This is going to be some party._

 

In the kitchen, Freddie popped the tops on three beers and set out the trays of food she had gotten from a Greek restaurant on the way—humus, tabouli, and grilled eggplant with red sauce and rice. While they fixed plates, Freddie floated her idea for the evening’s entertainment.

“I thought we could have poker night,” she said. "Just us guys."

“I don’t play poker,” Frederick said.

“I can teach you. It will be fun.”

“I didn’t say I don’t know _how_ to play poker. I know how. I just don't.”

“If he doesn’t want to play he doesn’t have to,” Will said. “We can do something else.”

“What are we doing instead?” she asked.

They looked at each other and said nothing. Will shrugged.

“Why does this have to be difficult?” Freddie asked, rubbing the bridge of her nose. She wondered if she should go straight to hard liquor.

“Freddie…” Will started, but Frederick cut him off.

“No. It’s okay, " Frederick said. "Freddie, I don’t play poker, or any card game because I have a gambling problem. My grandfather brought me to the track when I was three and it was all downhill from there. I’m surprised your investigation into my past didn’t rake that up. Why leave out any of my painful past in your intelligence gathering?”

“Your financials were not unusual,” she said and when Will looked at her, she said, “I was looking to see if he was taking bribes. He wasn’t. But I didn’t see any unexplained lack of funds either.”

“Hitting rock bottom doesn’t always mean sleeping in the gutter in a pile of one’s own filth,” Frederick said. “In my case, I ruined an important relationship because I chose to put gambling first. Since then, I quit and I don’t even touch playing cards.”

“You had to push it…” Will muttered at Freddie.

“You knew?” Freddie asked Will.

“I figured,” he said.

“Intuitive leap?” Frederick asked.

“You seem like an addictive personality to me, I just wasn’t sure what form it would take. If you weren’t dipping into the patients’ morphine supply, it would be something like gambling…or sex addiction.”

“And this is why I wanted to play a game,” Freddie said, “to avoid such delightful interactions as that.”

“What about a board game?” Will said. “I have a bunch in the closet upstairs.”

“You do?” Freddie asked.

“Doesn’t everyone?”

“You aren’t everyone,” Frederick said. “Board games are so middle America pedestrian.”

“When people don’t know what to give as gifts they give board games,” Will said. “Either that or cologne.”

 

Most of the games in the upstairs closet were still in their original plastic wrap. Freddie started reading out titles.

“Risk?”

“I’d like to sleep tonight,” Will said. “Risk takes forever and it more conducive to making enemies than friends.”

“I’m going to guess no one wants to play Clue...What about Monopoly?”

“I’m not playing any game that has ‘go directly to jail’ in it,” Will said.

“Why do you have Candyland?” asked Frederick, peering over Freddie’s shoulder.

“In case a kid comes over,” Will said.

“Maybe we can make a drinking game out of it,” Freddie said. “I’ll put it in the ‘maybe’ pile.”

“Scrabble!” Frederick said, pointing, trying to direct Freddie to it.

“Pass,” said Will. He could foresee a night of arguing with Frederick about whether words were playable or not.

“What about Jenga?” Freddie asked.

“That wouldn’t be fair,” Will said, making a “v” with his fingers and pointing at his eyes, then at Frederick. “He doesn’t have any depth perception.”

Frederick ignored the dig because he had spied a familiar black and white tin. “I see Uno. Let’s play that.”

“That’s a card game. Are you sure?” Freddie asked.

“They don’t play Uno in Atlantic City, so it doesn’t hit my sweet spot,” he said. “I know my boundaries. I play it with my nieces all the time and it never caused me to relapse.”

Freddie took the tin down. “Fair warning, I am ruthless at this game.”

Frederick reached over and snatched the tin out of her hands. “We’ll see.”

 

“You all are lucky this isn’t Scrabble,” Frederick said once he had lost several hands in a row. “I would kick your asses.”

“I doubt that,” Freddie said. "We all have good vocabularies."

“It’s a conspiracy. No one played yellow that entire round,” Frederick said. "I think you two are colluding."

They were keeping track of points and Frederick was in last place. Will had started out strong, but midway through beer three he had gotten careless and Freddie took the lead.

 As Freddie dealt the next hand, Will heaved himself out of the chair.

“Anyone like another beer while I’m up? Fred? Fred?”

They both declined.

“I shouldn’t drink at all. It’s bad for my remaining kidney,” Frederick said.

 “Fuck your remaining kidney,” Will said amiably from the kitchen.

“Up until last year I had all my original parts—appendix, tonsils you name it. Then all this happens.” Will came back in the room with the beers and Frederick addressed him without skipping a beat. “You lose any parts?”

Will had brought all three of them beers and set them down in front of each of them.

“Nothing to get upset over,” he said “but the cut was so ragged my abdominal muscles are shot to hell. At least you got a clean midline incision. It must have closed up nicely.”

“Not all that nicely, “ Frederick said. “There’s a reason all OB surgeons switched to transverse incisions years ago. The vertical cut is more damaging, far more likely to cause damage and lasting scar tissue.”

“But I didn’t get a careful surgical transverse with a scalpel,” Will said. “This is a jagged cut made with a kitchen knife.”

“I would bet those knives were as sharp as scalpels.”

“You two sound like my grandfather and his brother when they get together to complain about their bursitis,” Freddie said.

Will stood and pulled up his shirt, showing the pinkish raised scar that traveled an unsteady line from one side to the other.

“Just look at that,” he said. “Tell me that was a good clean cut.”

“Sit down, Will,” Freddie said. “Or if you two want to see whose is bigger, I’ll just leave the room and you can both whip ‘em out.”

“I’ll admit his is bigger, but its crooked,” Frederick said and they all laughed.

Will took a pull from his beer. “He knows because he used to watch me shower.”

“Wha…I did not!”

“Now this is a story I want to hear!” Freddie said and leaned forward with her elbows on the table.

“There is no story to hear,” Frederick said, trying to talk over Will.

Will turned to Freddie. “Dr. Chilton had all of BSHCI rigged for audio and video, even the shower area.”

“If there _were_ cameras—and I’m not saying that there were--” He looked pointedly at Freddie, “but if there were cameras it was for security reasons only, I assure you.”

“In the showers? You watched me _shower_ for my own safety? We only went in one at a time and had the orderlies watching us.”

“Some of my patients were suicidal. Others were both very dangerous and resourceful.”

“Frederick, what am I going to accomplish naked?”

“Who knows!” Frederick said, exasperated. “You are consistently surprising, even when you’re naked.”

The cards were forgotten as they all laughed. Freddie noticed both Will and Frederick placed a bracing hand on their wounded stomachs.

“Fred, you’re a halfway decent human being once you get the stick out of your ass,” Freddie said.

Frederick lifted his cane up and gave it a significant swirl.

“It’s not easy being in charge of a facility like the Baltimore State Hospital…” he said in parody of his own pompous tone.

“It’s not easy being _in_ a facility like the Baltimore State Hospital.” Will interrupted.

He inclined the cane handle towards Will. “Then I did my job.  That facility is not a summer camp. Being a hard ass comes with the territory. One has to be uncompromising with everyone: the staff, the press and the…”

“Inmates?” Will suggested.

“Patients.” he finished, then picked up the cards he had been dealt and gave them his attention. “But I’m not in charge of anything anymore so let it all go to hell for all I care.”

They toasted to that.

Will shuffled and dealt. Fredrick's phone rang. He looked at the display, suddenly serious.

"Don't answer that," Will said. "We're in the middle of a hand."

"I have to take this," Frederick said, leaving the table.

Will held up his hand to Freddie, but he didn't have to signal her. They both strained to hear, but Frederick didn't say much beyond "yeah…uh-huh."

He came back in, a smile pasted on his face.

"Frederick," Will said.

"That…wasn't anything…" he stopped and looked at Freddie and Will. "…it's just…" His smile faltered and failed. "That was the director of a rehab facility I know who promised me a phone call. Alana Bloom just came out of her coma."

"Excuse me," Will said, pushing his chair back so hard it fell over.  He grabbed his coat and went out into the cold darkness.

"Should we…?" Frederick started, but Freddie shook her head at him. Will came back a minute later, pale but bright pink in the cheeks like he had a fever.

"Your jeep is blocking me in," he said to Freddie. "Can you move it, please?"

"No," Freddie said. "You are too drunk to drive. You aren't going anywhere tonight."

"As you are so fond of pointing out, you aren't my mother," he said, his voice full of cold fury. "So move your fucking car or I will drive right through it."

"You'll have to drive through it, then, because I'm not moving it."

He stormed back outside and they waited for the sound of an engine revving and metal crunching on metal, but there was nothing.

"He's going to walk it off," Freddie said.

"He's easier to manage in a cage," Frederick mused. "Should I have held back that information about Dr. Bloom?"

"He was going to find out one way or the other," Freddie said.

"I do not know what possessed me to start being truthful for once. I think I was just rattled. I didn't even get to tell him everything. Alana asked for him. For him and Hannibal both.  How could I tell him that?"

Freddie realized she was tired, physically and mentally.

"I'm going to bed," she said. "You should, too. The party is over."

 "What about Will? Its freezing out there. Shouldn't we go out and get him? "

"It will take more than hypothermia to kill him," she said. "He'll come back when he calms down. Feel free to wait up for him if you want."

Frederick looked at the mess of plates and beer bottles on the table and said, "Do you want help cleaning up?"

"Just leave it," she said. "Will can clean it up when he gets back. He can't get out of kitchen duty that easily."

 

Freddie slipped on a nightgown. Her usual sleepwear was one of Will's t-shirts or nothing at all, but with Frederick just across the hall she felt better in actual pajamas. She was supposed to be a guest here too.

She listened to Frederick move around downstairs. She heard the front door opening, but it was just Frederick going out to look around. He came back in stamping his feet. Freddie was still awake when Frederick gave up and went to bed. Still she stayed awake, listening for the sound of Will coming back home, but she fell asleep before that happened.

She woke when her door opened, letting in light from the hall. She knew it was Will before she opened her eyes.

He sat on the bed. She could feel the chill seep from his clothes and skin.

"Did you get that out of your system?" she asked "You acted like a real asshole tonight."

"I'm not dealing with this situation very well," he said. "The fallout of this keeps exploding just when I think things have settled down. I just manage to get myself together and it only takes the merest gust of wind to push me back down."

"Why are you telling me this?"

"By way of apology. You are right. I was drunk. Probably still am. But even if I was sober I don't know if I would have acted any better."

"You have to apologize to Frederick in the morning, too. He's your guest. He was very concerned about you."

"I'm sure he was," he said sarcastically. "He must have loved to see me lose it. He's probably adding this to my profile right now."

"He was waiting up for you.  It upset him to see how upset you were by his news. You should be a little easier on him," she said. "He has been humbled by his experience and he feels you have a bond now. Did you see how relaxed he is around you? He wants to be your friend."

"Okay okay," he said. “Thank you for bringing Frederick here. It may not have ended ideally, but I appreciate what you are trying to do.”

“What was I trying to do?”

“You were forcing me to socialize. Since I won’t go out, you brought the party to me, such as it was,” he said. “You did something selfless, just for me. So maybe I was wrong, about that one little thing. Maybe you aren't _entirely_ selfish.”

“Don’t get the wrong idea, Will. I’m going to look out for myself first. Always.”

"Does that leave room for anyone else?"

"Sometimes," she said. "But how long can we go on being each other's second best?"

"Do we have to figure this out now? I'm so tired. I just want to sleep. I couldn't fall asleep alone downstairs. Can I sleep here tonight?"

They had been sleeping apart ever since Will’s fishing trip, when he started his silent treatment.

“I don't think that's a good idea," she said. "I'm probably going to pack up my things and leave tomorrow."

"You are moving out because I wanted to go see Alana?"

"I can’t play this kind of game where you push me away with one hand and pull me closer with the other,” Freddie said. “I move in and you ignore me. We settle things between us and then you freeze me out.  I give you the space you want and you crawl into bed with me. I can’t have you breaking our deal and expecting to jump back into my bed whenever you feel like.”

“Do you think I’m playing a game?” Will asked. “I don’t have the ability to play a game with you. All my strategy circuits are burned out from overuse. I’m doing my best, but when the past comes calling, it stirs up the barely settled muck and what I thought was clear becomes clouded. Right now I’m pulling you close to me with both hands, but I can’t guarantee what I’ll do tomorrow. I don’t know myself as well as I thought I did. I don't have the control over what comes back. So if I don't want to talk about something its because I don't think I can contain all of it. Hearing about Alana brought a lot of memories back.”

"And you won't share any of those memories with me."

He turned to her.

"You aren't exactly an open book yourself, Freddie. What do I know about you? I told you about Margot right away. You never told me about Brian."

"That was work," she said contemptuously.

"Is that what you are going to say about me in a few months? Are you going to complain about all the things you had to do to get your book written? Making nice with the psychopath must be _so_ hard for you."

"If you think that, then go," she said. "I'll leave for good in the morning. Go downstairs, pour yourself some whiskey and wallow in your self-pity. I won't be joining you."

She was surprised by Will's sudden wrenching sob. She couldn’t see him in the dark, but when she touched his face, she could feel that he had been crying. She held his head to her chest like he was a child while he cried.

"I wanted to tell Alana I am sorry," he said.

"Its not your fault what happened. She knows that."

"Not that," he said. He said, so quietly it was almost a whisper, “I miss him, Freddie.”

“Stop,” she said. She didn't want to hear what he had to say. She knew it, but she didn't want to hear it out loud.

“I wish I could,” he said. "I try, but I think about that night all the time. When I can’t lie to myself any more I lock myself in and let it wash over me. I think about Hannibal. I don’t want to.  It can take hours to run through me. It’s like a fever that has to spike before it can break. That’s what I think about when I need to be alone.”

 “You are drunk,” she said, “and you need to go to sleep. Everything will look better in the morning.”

"It won't. It won't change. When I'm sober I'm just better at hiding it."

He ran his hands over and then under the thin cotton nightgown she wore. She kept her hands high, around his neck and in his hair, unsure of where to touch him. Unsure if she wanted to comfort him in this way now. But he was insistent and needy. He undressed and pressed himself against her. His hands were cold.

"Don't leave me," he said.

“Who are you thinking about now?" she asked. "Who are you imagining I am in the dark and crying over? I won’t be your stand in for Margot or Alana or…anyone else.”

“I need you, Freddie,” he said. In the scant light her body was smooth as marble, only if looked closely could he see the tracery of veins under the skin. He could follow the path of her blood with his fingers. “You walked through the fire without a singe. You are who you always are, unchanged. I want you to give that to me. Whatever you have that makes you impenetrable.”

“I can’t give that to you. It’s just who I am.”

“Then let me be close to you,” he said, and pulled her nightgown over her head. She held his hands still.

“I need to know you are thinking about _me_ , fucking _me_ , not anyone else.”

“I’m only thinking about you,” he said.

“Say it,” she said.

He did. He said her name first as a whisper. Maybe it was the darkness and the alcohol and the vulnerability, because the words came tumbling out. entered her he kept up a steady stream of language, until the sounds lost all meaning and she almost wished he would stop. It sounded like the edge of madness.

  _Freddie Freddie Freddie my Shiva, dancing in fire laughing at destruction, flames on your head and ashes on your feet, burning while the world melts away in tears and blood Freddie beautiful phoenix creator and destroyer, you can undo me, you can take me apart, but I can't stay away, despite that, because of that. Freddie. I'm thinking of you, only of you. You make me forget. You burn away the past the present so temporary, a blinding flash but its enough. I can't give you up any more than a moth can resist the pull of the candles flame. If destruction means I won't remember anymore, destroy me, Freddie. Throw me in a sacrificial fire…_

 

Two doors and a hallway away, Frederick lay in bed, fully awake and semi-aroused by what he could hear was plainly going on in the other room. Will's footsteps outside his door had awoken him and the crying  had gotten his interest, but then the noises changed.

This evening was telling him more about Freddie than Will. Frederick had always had a grudging respect for the way Freddie got things done, but he had never saw her as physically alluring. Maybe he had to reconsider. She had _something_ going for her. Something about her had drawn Will Graham in.

Frederick turned over in bed, back to the door, as if turning his back on his own thoughts and dismissing them. With a little more mental effort, he convinced himself that he was worrying over this new facet of Freddie he had never considered, instead of how he felt about the repeated moaning of what, to his ears, was his own name, over and over in the familiar voice of his former patient.


	7. Coming Clean

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Freddie interviews Randall Tier's parents, which stirs up some uncomfortable feelings for her--and for Will too. He acts more unstable than usual, revealing some personal information about himself and about Freddie too.
> 
> Its basically a smut sandwich with angst as the bread.

The Tiers hadn't given any interviews, but Freddie never let that stop her.  Following a hunch, she forwarded them the links to the stories she had done on Will, hoping her open questioning of his sanity would convince them she sympathetic. While she waited for them to respond, she worked on her Alana Bloom story ("Cannibal Killer's Lover Wakes From Coma") with help from an "unnamed source" (Frederick Chilton).

A few hours later, Mrs. Tier sent Freddie a rambling e-mail that made her position clear: Will Graham and Dr. Lecter were equally responsible for what happened to Randall. The theory that Randall had also been a killer was not accepted in the Tier house. Freddie wrote back in vague sympathetic terms and they set up a time for the interview.

Freddie went to the Tier home eager to see what kind of home life fostered such a monster. Their house, and the Tiers themselves, were disappointingly ordinary. Mrs. Tier showed Freddie around and let her take pictures of Randall's childhood bedroom to illustrate the story. The room looked like a set designer's idea of a normal kid's room, artfully messy but generic. After the tour, they sat in the living room for the official interview. Freddie put her recorder on the glass and chrome table between them.

"Tell me what Randall was like," Freddie started.

“Randall had his problems,” Mrs. Tier said. “That’s why we sent him to Dr. Lecter.”

“He needed to be socialized,” Mr. Tier said. His wife shot him a look that Freddie thought was slightly hostile. _A dog needs to be socialized_ , Freddie thought and looked back at Mr. Tier with an interested eye.

“He did so much better under Dr. Lecter’s care,” Mrs. Tier said. “But now I have to wonder what he did to my son. The two of them, Graham and Dr. Lecter, they framed him.”

“Mr. Graham was also a patient of Dr. Lecter’s,” Freddie said gently. “Do you think it's possible he was framed too?”

“That psycho killed our son,” Mr. Tier said. “He was working for the FBI and he was a killer the whole time.”

“Just hearing what they did to our son’s body was enough to make me ill," Mrs. Tier said "I didn't even see the pictures. I was told they were too gruesome for me to look at.”

Freddie remembered the jawbone she found in Will’s freezer, tongue still attached. She had seen the pictures and they were gruesome.

“And he’s walking free,” Mr. Tier said. “They should lock him back up. He belongs in a straitjacket, not walking the streets. ”

“What kind of person would do that?” Mrs. Tier asked.

"It takes a certain kind of person to do that to another human being," Mr. Tier said. "Sick."

 

That kind of person had been sleeping next to Freddie when she woke up that morning in the bed that was just steps away from the spot on the floor where Randall died. She had tried to get ready quietly, but that person knew when she was awake and stirred when she stirred. That person made her coffee while she got dressed, and set a steaming mug on the bathroom counter while she fixed her hair and makeup in the mirror. That person was waiting for her to get back to the home they shared. That person reminded her before she left that it was his turn to make dinner so she didn't have to worry about it.

Those same hands that had touched the Tiers' son had touched her. She spent nights with her head on that killer's chest, listening to the beating of his heart. What kind of person did that and, without shame, would do it again night after night?

 

Freddie came home with the mental fatigue that comes with putting up barriers, lying and nodding at the Tiers’ ridiculous claims.  Their son didn’t deserve to die the way he did, but he was not the saint they insisted he was. Freddie thought she saw a flicker of knowledge in Mr. Tier’s eyes. If she could have gotten him alone, he might have been more honest with her about his son’s sins, but Mrs. Tier hung on Freddie. She was so relieved to have a sympathetic ear to pour out her laments too. Freddie got the idea that she had already exhausted every friend she had with her theories and rage.

When she walked in the door, Freddie heard the water-running-through-the-pipes sound than meant Will was taking a shower. A shower sounded so good and knowing Will was in it made it even better.  Every time Mrs. Tier had said his name, Freddie tried to deny the tight grip of heat in her chest and in her belly.

She opened the bathroom door, already undressing. Will turned, squinting one eye against the shampoo dripping into his eyes.

“I sure hope that’s you, Freddie,” he said.

“Who else?" she said. "Can I join you? I’m so beat."

“Tough interview?”

“Do you want to hear about it?”

“Not really,” he said.

Naked, she stepped into the shower and under the spray. She closed her eyes. The coursing water felt so nice, like all the tension of the day was slipping down the drain.

"That was a big sigh," Will said. "Relieved to be home?"

She hadn't realized the sigh had escaped her lips. She could have explained to him the delicate balancing act she had been doing all morning, but she didn't want to. It was easier to press herself against his back and slide her hands over his soapy chest and belly, carefully avoiding the scar that he was still sensitive about.

"Mmmm." He hummed low in his throat."Are you frisking me?"

"Oh yes," she said, letting her hands roam lower. "What are you hiding?"

"You have to find out for yourself. I won't squeal."

"I can make you squeal."

It was a farce, a sexual parody of the conversation they should be having. Instead of talking they were playing criminal and naughty cop.  She trailed her hand underneath his balls. He spread his legs apart so she could search him more thoroughly.  She lathered her hand and put one finger between his ass cheeks, teasing right at his entrance.

"Do you have any contraband?"

She smiled, waiting for him to call the game off. Maybe it was a little cruel to do this to someone who had been an actual inmate and endured humiliating strip searches, but Freddie felt a bit cruel at the moment.

"Why don't you find out for yourself," he said, and she could feel him relax against her finger tip. She slid one soapy finger inside him, tentatively at first. He moaned and leaned his forehead against the tile wall.

"Another," he said, and she used a second finger, working the two in slowly, noticing, as if at a distance that he tolerated well two fingers right up to the knuckle. She didn't have to touch him to know he was rock hard. He didn't need or want her to stroke him too. He was working himself with one tight and soapy hand while using the other hand to brace himself against the wall.

She her free hand up into his hair, grabbed a handful and pulled his head back, exposing his throat. His eyes were closed and he was beyond the point of caring if she pulled his hair or got rough with him. She felt his orgasm as he tensed and released around her fingers, his come splashing across the tiles. She withdrew her fingers carefully and released her grip on his hair. His head slumped forward. She left him in the shower, water still running, with soap bubbles still rinsing off his inner thighs.

 

Freddie was back at the laptop, dressed and composed and typing. She had been working for a while before Will appeared, still dreamily happy. He came up behind her and dropped both hands on her shoulders, kneading the tight muscles with his strong hands.

"Can I do anything for you?" he asked, brushing his lips against her cheek. "Since you were so good to me?"

"I'm on deadline," she said brusquely.

"You were very accommodating considering we didn't discuss doing that beforehand."

"There's nothing to discuss," she said. "Everyone has things they like. You shared one with me in the heat of the moment." She turned back to her laptop screen. "It isn't the strangest thing someone has asked me to do."

"I forgot that nothing fazes you," he said. "You've seen it all and done it all. Life must be so boring for you."

"Are you mad that I wasn't shocked that you like a finger up your ass? Grow up," she said. "You aren't special in everything. In some ways, you are just like anyone else."

"If you think my goal is to be as different as possible, then you don't know the first thing about me," he said.

She ignored him and went back to work. Meeting the Tiers had got under her skin. Randall was one of the topics she and Will didn't talk about.  The list of what they couldn't discuss grew almost daily. Soon they wouldn't have anything to talk about at all. Their existence together would be sex and silence.

"Are you writing up your article about Randall?" Will asked.

"Yes."

"Randall Tier," he said, sounding pensive.  "Aren't you going to ask me about him and how he died? Don't you want to let me tell my side of the story?"

"Not really," she said.

"Poor kid," Will said. "But his death was necessary and inevitable."

"Because it was self-defense," Freddie said.

"To a point," he said. "The other stuff was theater, but it made Hannibal believe in me. It sold the lie. I know to outsiders it might look gratuitous, but Randall was dead. Nothing could change that. In death he became useful to me."

Freddie took her hands off the keyboard. "I can't use that," she said.

"I'm trying to talk to you about Hannibal," he said. "Stop writing and listen. I won't talk about Randall anymore. I'll talk about me and Hannibal and maybe you'll understand what happened to Randall and what happened to me. I was willing to do anything to convince Hannibal that we had a bond. I was waiting for the day he would ask for a sign of my devotion. I had to pass that test, but I didn't know what form that test would take. I couldn't know for sure. I conditioned myself to accept a lot of things: food, sex, violence—in any form they took. There was too much at stake for me to balk at anything. If I was going to ask other people to risk their lives on my ability to please Hannibal, I was going to please him. I was prepared for him to take me and use me in any possible way. I'm not proud of it, but I'm not ashamed of it either."

She almost laughed at his new attempt to shock her.  "You were going to take it up the ass for justice?"

"I watched a lot of porn. And I...experimented. For plausibility. I was supposed to be in love, in a way," he said. "Desperate to please."

"You blame Hannibal for a lot of your behavior," Freddie said. "That's the only time you are willing to talk about him, I've noticed. But I think you like getting fingered because you think its dirty and feeling guilty is a turn on for you."

"Are you psychoanalyzing me? You aren't qualified."

"You don't need a degree to know human nature," she said. "I think you will only allow yourself dirty sordid little affairs because that's all you think you are worthy of. You want to sound so self-sacrificial but part of you would have been relieved to bend over Hannibal's desk because it's what you think you deserve. You want to use everything you possibly can to punish yourself. You have a pattern, Mr. Graham. I used to think you slept with Margot because you were stupid and blinded by lust. Now I think you knew there was something very wrong about it and that made it attractive to you."

"Am I punishing myself with you?"

"We have mutually and publicly expressed how much we hate each other," she said. "You want Alana Bloom but think you deserve me."

"Don't," he said. "Don't say anything you can't take back."

"I know, because you think about killing people for a living." Freddie was on her feet. "I bet you are glad that Alana was Hannibal's lover, because now she's damaged enough for you. Damaged inside and out. You must me just itching to get to her bedside to co-opt someone else's suffering. It's like you can't produce enough of your own. You have to go seek it out."

He stepped back from her, closed his eyes and took a deep breath in then let it out slowly. She thought he was trying not to lash out and hit her, but when he opened his eyes they were heavy-lidded and slightly glazed and when he spoke he sounded unlike himself.

"Aren't we all damaged, seeking out others who are damaged, trying to make a whole out of a handful of broken pieces? Let's talk about you, Freddie. When you were fourteen you were declared by the court an emancipated minor. There were no adults in your life capable of caring for you but you were more than capable of caring for yourself. Your fourteen wasn't other girls' fourteen. They could sense your otherness. It clung to you like the aroma of smoke. The boys, they could sense it too, couldn't they? Your otherness? Your supposed vulnerability? It attracted them--their prurient interest, their experimental natures.

But you were meant for bigger things. You eventually dropped out and got your GED, because school for you was such a waste of time, and you had things to accomplish. You made the right choice. Your former classmates haven't done a single thing of significance since graduation and here you are, a self-made person, built from scratch with your own to hands. You run your own business. You are both the competent boss and the reliable employee. You are self-sufficient, needing neither a home nor companionship.

"It is not a coincidence that your chosen profession is as an observer. You think you are above the things you see. Tragedy happens to other people. Cops think that way too. We are the observers, the investigators. Cops aren't part of the case; journalists aren't part of the story. But when Abigail came along, you broke your rules. You entered into the story willingly, because you saw yourself in her. A girl on her own who had been taken advantage of. You wanted to teach her to grow the same protective shell you have. If you could save her some of the pain of growing the shell, you would. You walked that road and you could show her where to place her feet. While she was tender and vulnerable, while that shell was still forming you wanted to protect her from other people who didn't always have her best interests at heart. You wanted to protect her from people like me.

"But you failed. And now you are scared. The world is a violent uncertain place. If you had stayed on your own you would have been dead by now. You made your death into a fun game, but you know how serious it was. You were nearly killed. We are all part of the story now and you have the sneaking suspicion that it doesn't end well for any of us. You are clinging to me but it is a scant and threadbare hope. The only other option is being alone, and one person alone can't face down the devil."

She was frozen, horrified. The ideas were coming too fast for her to respond. He brought her hand up and kissed it. "You can dress it up in all the bravado you want, but we stay huddled together for warmth in the cold. We'd rather have the heat of our imperfect passions then freeze to death alone." He rubbed her hand where he had kissed it and then let it go. "I'll leave you to get your work done. I have to start dinner."

Freddie sat down at the desk, hands shaking. He had profiled her neatly, gutted her and laid her bare, her motivations and fears. He told her things she hadn't admitted to herself. She was capable of feeling fearful, lonely and vulnerable. She had never wanted to be in that place again, but she didn't have a choice. The ground fell out from under her feet.

He heard him downstairs, a pot being dropped and what sounded like a chair being knocked over, then a loud swear. The front door opened and closed. Freddie went to the window and watched as Will trudged out to the shed. Lately he had taken to drinking out there alone in the shed, because he knew he could be alone. Freddie wouldn't follow him out there.

Freddie did not like the shed.


	8. Freelance Therapy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Freddie seeks relationship advice from a Baltimore psychiatrist.   
> And birds come home to roost.

She heard the tapping of his cane first and then saw his silhouette through the frosted glass of the door in the moment before it opened inward. As Frederick showed her into his home, Freddie had a moment where she doubted her plan to tell the truth and considered an alternate story to tell.

"Excuse the mess," he said. There were boxes and packing material around and one of the couches was wrapped in plastic film. Cans of paint sat on a splattered tarp. "I'm redecorating."

Freddie chose the available unwrapped couch and Frederick sat down in the chair across from her.

"Thanks for meeting with me in person," she said.

"My pleasure. It was entertaining for me to be your unnamed source," he said. "I don't know anything else about Alana, though. Since you posted your story everyone clammed up."

"That happens," she said.  "I'm not here for a story. I'm here to talk. I'm looking for advice."

"It is natural you should come to me," he said. "Since I'm both a friend and psychiatrist."

"I don't need therapy," she said. "I have seen the outcome of your therapy, Frederick."

"I am capable of helping people," he said. "Everyone has seen my very public failures, but my success stories lack the salaciousness of my failures so they are forgotten. At BSHCI  I was given the worst of the worst to care for, the really hopeless cases. Of course there will be more failures than successes. I might have overreached myself looking for a miracle for some of my charges. My techniques, at times, may have been a little too proactive, a little too hands-on, but I think I learned my lesson. I've paid my pound of flesh and then some. But still I have to sit at home and look at fabric swatches and paint samples while I wait for the board at the BSHCI to decide my fate."

Frederick turned his head to look at Freddie straight on with his remaining eye. " None of the people I worked with, not one of them, have come by to see me. Not in the hospital and not at home. I spent so much time concentrating on my professional life that I don't have a lot of relationships outside that sphere. Everyone I know in the psychiatric world is waiting to see which way the wind blows. If I'm officially dismissed, I will never hear from any of them again. I will be erased as if I never existed, my name a whispered by-word, a morality lesson to keep freshly-minted therapists in line. But if I'm reinstated there will be no end of people calling on me and assuring me they were in my corner the whole time, maybe even claiming they were advocating for me behind the scenes. So please, do me the favor of taking up my time and attention while I wait in purgatory.

"Even if you want to drag me to another sleepover." He smiled, not his smug public smile. In his home, surrounded by his domestic clutter, he lacked the buttoned up armor he had in court or in his office. This was his private self and who knows how often he shared that smile with anyone else.

"No sleepovers," she said.

"But this _is_ about Will Graham, isn't it?" he said. "Because if you aren't here about a story, what else would it be about?"

The comment stung Freddie because it was true. What did she have to worry about in her life other than Will? Frederick, who was going through such a hard time himself, was willing to sit and listen to Freddie talk about Will.

"You had Will in your care," Freddie said. "You've seen him in a variety of situations both professional and social. Have you formed any opinions about him?"

"I have."

"What are they? If you don't mind sharing."

"This isn't for a story?"

"This is for my own peace of mind."

"Will is very charming when he wants to be and yet very difficult to get to know. If you think you have a bead on who he is, start doubting yourself." He leaned forward. "I had a camera on him almost 24 hours a day when he was at my facility. I saw him change with each visitor he had. I still don't know what he's like when he's alone and his defenses are down, but I would wager that neither do you. Tell me what you think you know about him and I'll tell you if I agree."

"Before I met him, I thought he was a psychopath," Freddie said slowly. "Then, when we met…I still thought he was a psychopath. Then I thought he wasn't, and now I'm not sure."

"Did you think he is just misunderstood?" Frederick asked, voice tinged with sarcasm.

"He _is_ misunderstood," she said. "but that doesn't make him innocent--or sane."

"It certainly doesn't."

"But he saved my life," she said. 

"In the most traumatic way possible," Frederick said.

"Do you think he's _dangerous_?"

"I'm hesitant to pass any judgment on Will. He has an uncommon mind. I've been wrong before when it comes to him. It becomes even trickier when he sets out to be deceptive, and I don't know if he is ever _not_ deceptive. It might just be a matter of degree of deception at any given moment. His ability to put on a mask has served him well in life so far. He might not be able to abandon it at this point."

"We all have a face we present to the world," Freddie said. "We all have secrets."

"Not all secrets are equal," he said. "I'm just dying to know: What's bringing this on now? Will having a dark side to his personality is not news to anyone. As you pointed out, you've been tracking Will's mental status since before you met. You willingly entered into a relationship with a man who terrorized you and physically assaulted you. He explained that away and you forgave him. I'm not judging you, for your actions. I'm just stating the facts. What could he have done that was worse than that, that you cannot find it inside yourself to forgive him? What has he done to you lately, Freddie, that has you so scared?"

"He profiled me," she said. "For no good reason. Just because he was angry. He got in my head and told my story back to me. It was eerie and accurate. It felt like a violation."

"How was it a violation?"

"It should be my choice when to share aspects of my life. He shouldn't go in my head and pluck things out."

"I thought he only did that with killers," Frederick said. 

"I understand why he does that with killers. He's trying to catch them."

"And now you are wondering what was his purpose in doing it to you?"

"I think..." she said, "he just wanted to show me that he could."

"Why are you staying with him?" Frederick asked. "Why did you go to be with him in the first place? This is out of character from what I know of you."

"I was scared," she said. "I acted out of fear. It snuck up on me because I didn't realize how afraid I was to be leaving FBI protection. I put on a brave front, but I was frightened at how close I came to death. Will came to visit me and he wore his fear on his sleeve. It was attractive. He pulled me in with his vulnerability. When he survived…I thought he didn't have anyone else left and he needed me to get him through this tough time. I thought he was doing the same thing for me."

"But you don't believe that now," Frederick said.

"I don't," she said. "But I'm afraid of what will happen to both of us if I leave. That will be the blood on my hands."

"You are not responsible for Will," Frederick said. "and I don't trust him to be responsible for you."

"I might not survive without him."

"You might not survive with him," Frederick countered.

"I don't have a choice. How long can I survive alone?"

"You are afraid of Hannibal, rightly so. If Hannibal comes back someday he will want to go straight to Will. They haven't settled things between them, and I would hate for you to get caught in the middle when Hannibal decides he's ready for another dance with Will Graham."

"Will would warn me, get me out of the way somehow. He did it once already," she said. "If I try to make it on my own and Hannibal comes back I will be dead before I know what hit me. I won't see it coming. I just narrowly escaped the first time." Freddie felt the long-suppressed panic start to rise. Fight or flight. She felt like she wanted to bolt out of the house. Hannibal had been here in Frederick's house. He had killed people in here, gutted and sliced them. "He tried to eat me, Frederick. He dug up my corpse and now he knows Will and I played a trick on him. I can't face that alone. What he did to Beverly Katz…"

Frederick moved next to her on the couch and held her, gently pressing her head against his shoulder.

"You want to be safe," Frederick said when she finally calmed enough to be able to listen. "but I don't know if staying with Will Graham is the right way." He went to a side table and brought her a box of tissues. She dabbed at her nose and he sat back down next to her.

"What if Will snaps someday and it is just the two of you in that house. What if Hannibal comes back and they decide to finish you off together?"

"He wouldn't," she said, but she remembered how Will whispered _I miss him_. Randall had died on the living room floor as a sign of Will's devotion. Was what Hannibal had done to Beverly and worse than what Will had done to Randall? He said at one time he had been ready to do anything. Maybe part of him still was.

"Don't go back to Wolf Trap," Frederick said. "You can stay here for a while. I have a guest room that I just finished doing a makeover on. Its very cozy. You could be my first guest. We could have that sleepover after all."

"I don't know if I could feel any safer here after what happened," she said. "I don't know how you can, honestly."

"I'll be damned if I'll let Hannibal take anything else away from me," he said hotly. "I will not be complicit in his destruction of my life. I can't control everything, but he will not take my home away from me." He chuckled at himself. "I sound like Scarlet O'Hara."

She smiled thinly. Frederick sighed.

"I don't know," he said "Maybe I should put my pride aside and leave the country. Go pick coffee beans in Costa Rica," he said. "We could both go. Just pick up stakes and tell Baltimore to go fuck itself."

Freddie's phone chirped. It was a text from Will. He never called or texted her, especially when she was working, which is what she told him she was doing today. She looked at the garbled message.

_Pls call me when you get this.V imprtnat._

"You don't have to answer that," Frederick said. "Whatever it is, it can wait. _He_ can wait."

While she was looking at the phone it rang. To Frederick's disapproving frown she answered it.

"Can this wait? I'm in an interview."

"No. I wouldn't call if this wasn't important."

She could hear from the ambient noise and the faint sound of radio news, he was calling from the car.

"Are you going somewhere?" she asked.

"I'm on my way to the train station," he said. "Matthew Brown called me. He's out of jail. I'm going to pick him up."

"Why are you going to get him? How is he even out of jail? Did he break out? You can't get involved."

"It's all legal, Freddie. I'll explain back at the house. I just wanted you to know he'll be there when you get home, so don't be suprised…okay. I see him waiting on the curb. I have to go now."

Freddie looked at the phone in her hand, willing the line to reconnect so she could make Will explain himself.

Frederick watched her expression and began to mirror her worry. "Who broke out of jail?" he asked gravely.

"No one," she said, putting her phone away.

"What was that about?" he asked. "Should I be concerned?"

"That depends," she said. "How well did you get along with your former employee Matthew Brown?"

 


	9. Sugar on the Pill

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Against Frederick Chilton's advice, Freddie returns to Wolf Trap to find out why Matthew Brown was released from jail, and why he has moved into Will's house.

_Why am I going back? Why?_

Freddie twisted the knob on the radio with more force than she needed to. A squawk of music filled her ears. She twisted it back down to therapeutic levels and concentrated on the road. The hum of the music couldn't drown out her thoughts no matter how loud she made it.

As a rule, she didn't go for introspection. She didn't like to churn her guts over  _what ifs_. It got in the way of action. But if Will wanted to flip through her mind like a drawer in a filing cabinet, shouldn't she do the same to herself? 

If she started to listen she would hear a siren call bringing her back to the little farmhouse in the middle of nowhere.

_Why?_

She turned the car around, pointing it back towards Frederick's house, then north, away from everyone. She could hop a flight to LA or start over in New York City.

She would be a fool to walk away from being deeply imbedded in one of the biggest stories in the country. Reporters of all stripes were scrambling for the smallest scraps of this story. _Hannibal the Cannibal_. Of all the stupid things. 

The other day Freddie read an interview with a woman who had  _once_  been to dinner party at Hannibal Lecter's house. She had been arm candy for one of Baltimore's power brokers for a while and he had taken her to a lot of society events. The society matrons were not talking, but this girl had been dumped by her sugar daddy and didn't mind parlaying her little affair into a second unexpected payday, even if it meant telling the world of her accidental cannibalism.  _This_  girl was news. Freddie couldn't turn her back on the possibilities right in front of her, possibilities so much richer than some silver fox's girlfriend of the week. That's what Will was counting on. _It's all yours, Freddie._ The exclusive. She was the only reporter around who knew Matthew Brown, Lecter's alleged attacker, was out of jail.

Will knew he had made a mistake profiling her. He had figured out by now that she might never come back because of it. No vase of flowers, however perfectly chosen, would change her mind this time. Any gift he could give her would be returned. The one thing that would be sure to lure her back was to appeal to her curiosity again. Freddie didn't know how he had pulled Matthew Brown out of his pocket and she wouldn't know until she got back to Wolf Trap.

Frederick had been disappointed in her.  "I don't beg," he said, "and I'm not begging now. What I am doing is  _strongly urging_  you to rethink this plan of action. Where there was one unknown quantity there is now two."

"I understand that," Freddie said, buttoning her coat in Frederick's entryway. "If I feel like I'm in any danger, I will leave."

"Like hell, you will," he said. "If that were true, you would already be long gone. Do you have a gun?"

"In my purse. All the time. At night I sleep with it loaded in my nightstand."

"Keep it under your pillow," he said. He hugged her and gave her a chaste kiss on the cheek. His face was grim. "Call me when you get there. Let me know you arrived safely."

She promised, although it wasn't the journey he thought was unsafe for her, but the destination.

 

* * * 

 

Matthew rose when Freddie entered the room, but Will didn't. Will half-smiled, looking amused at Matthew's chivalry. Matthew was dressed like a casual preacher: khaki pants and a white button-down shirt. No tie. He put both hands in his pocket and nodded at Freddie.

"Ms. Lounds," he said. He rocked forward on the balls of his feet, putting forth the "aw-shucks" simpleton image she had seen before at BSCHI. She hadn't paid much attention to him before, but that was when he was just the orderly with the ring of keys.

"Mr. Brown," she said. She strode forward and stuck out her hand. "Nice to see you again. If you have time to sit down I would love to interview you. I can't wait to hear how you did manage to be released from jail, especially in light of all the evidence against you."

"My lawyer would kill me if I gave you an interview," he said cheerfully, rolling his eyes. _Lawyers, right?_ "I'll let Mr. Graham fill you in on the details. I haven't even had time to unpack."

"Of course, Matthew," said Will, his tone warm and soothing, Matthew's name honeyed in his mouth.  _Laying it on a bit thick aren't you, Will,_  Freddie thought.  "You don't need to go over all that with Ms. Lounds. Go ahead upstairs, second door on your right. Make yourself comfortable."

Matthew's belongings were in a dingy white pillowcase, which he took up the stairs with him. Will and Freddie waited until they heard his footsteps overhead.

"He called me from the train station," Will said. "I had to make a quick decision."

"So you took him in like a stray," she said. "He isn't a fucking dog, Will, he's--"

"A killer? Dangerously unstable?" Will said. "Willing to be manipulated? Desperate for a connection? Should I go on?"

"You two are a match made in heaven," she said bitterly. "Look I get it. Your number one fan is out of jail. But why am I here, then if you have found someone more suitable to spend your time with? Is this the big break-up scene?" She felt a flare of anger that was invigorating. Having an unsuitable boyfriend initiate a break-up was comfortingly banal. It felt like solid ground.  "By the way, it was considerate of you not to give him my room in my absence. This way, I can pack while across the hall Matthew unpacks. It gives the whole scene a nice symmetry."

"I don't want you to leave, unless that's what you want," he said. "I won't stand in your way, but I would encourage you to stay. For your own benefit."

She crossed her arms.

"Let me start with the public information," Will said, leaning back in his chair, making space for the speech he was about to deliver. "The press release, if you will. All charges against Matthew Brown have been dropped, due to lack of evidence. No charges are being brought against me in connection with the deaths of the Bailiff, Andrew Sykes, and Judge Davies or in the attempted murder of Hannibal Lecter. That is as far as I can go with an official statement."

Freddie sat down across from him. "Now, off the record?"

"Off the record, the murders of Sykes and Davies are being attributed to Hannibal Lecter."

"Did he really kill them?"

"He killed the judge, and it would have been fitting with the way Hannibal operates to kill Sykes as well, as homage to himself. He hates sharing credit and I was getting credit for his crimes," Will sounded almost bored as he spoke, rubbing the stubble on his neck with one hand.

"What about the attempted murder plot of Dr. Lecter?" she asked. "You two conspired to kill him and got awfully close. That all goes away? The FBI stops caring about the case because the victim was a bad man?"

"'Bad man' is a hell of an understatement. That's not the reason, though. Kade Prurnell would love to bring charges against us. They don't have the witnesses to put together a cohesive case. Jack is dead, Alana is unavailable. Who knows what she can remember? Hannibal fled the country and when they find him he will have bigger fish to fry than testifying  as the victim in this case. The witness against me in the conspiracy charge, Abel Gideon, is also dead. The only people who can testify to a plot between me and Matthew is me or Matthew. That is why he is here. That's the snap decision I had to make. He won't testify against me, not as long as I keep him under my wing."

"What about me?" Freddie said. She felt the cold warning chill on the back of her neck. "I put you two in contact through Tattlecrime. That's at least circumstantial evidence."

"I wouldn't go reminding people of that," he said.

"Is that why it benefits me to stay and be friendly?" Freddie asked. "So I don't become another dead witness?"

Will winced. "That's a blunt way of putting it. Being nice to Matthew won't do you any harm. And how can you resist? Living with one killer was fine, but it was getting a little tiresome for you. Living with two killers—well that's almost exciting."

"Fuck you," she said.

He shrugged.

"You can go," he said. "I won't keep you. But I want you to think hard about where you would be the safest. If you are afraid of me or Matthew, you should go. I give you my blessing and wish you the best. But if you are afraid of Hannibal Lecter, remember who came the closest to ending his life. That man…" Will waved a hand toward the stairs. "…hates Hannibal with a pure and savage passion. He hates Hannibal more thoroughly than ever because Hannibal didn't just betray me, he hurt me. He almost _killed_ me.  Matthew Brown is willing and able to unhesitatingly end Hannibal forever. Personally, that makes me feel very safe."

" _You_  would. Matthew feels protective towards you," Freddie said. "He doesn't feel the same towards me."

"I extend my protection," he said, with a smile and an almost papal arm sweeping motion.  _He's been drinking_ , Freddie thought. "If I tell him not to touch you, he won't. He's very loyal. He risked his own life because I asked him to. How could I refuse to take him in after that? How can I refuse him anything?"

"Hopefully, there are some limits to your gratitude."

 * * *

It wasn't a surprise that Freddie couldn't sleep that night. The house magnified every sound. It didn't help that after a tense and quiet dinner, Will excused himself to drink alone in the shed and hadn't come back. She and Matthew tried to avoid being in the same room at the same time without being obvious about it. That dance had gone on until Freddie decided it was late enough to be bedtime.

Every time Freddie drifted off to sleep, she woke with a start when she heard Matthew in the other room--his footsteps and sighing breaths and the rustle of sheets as he turned over in bed. Her door was locked, and she wasn't afraid as much as she was very aware. Around midnight she texted Frederick to tell him she was okay.  He texted her back right away.

_< <I will come and get you just say the word and save a bullet>>_

_< <You can't drive>>_

_< <I can't *legally* drive>>_

_< <Calm down cowboy. I have a gun and a locked door between me and anyone else>>_

Freddie fell asleep with the phone next to her on the pillow. She was fitful, expecting to be woken by the small clinking sound of a key in the lock, or the smell of whiskey and movement of the bed when someone sat on it. But none of that happened. She woke to the sun-filled room thinking  _I lived to see another day._

 

Throughout the first week, she texted Frederick twice a day: once when she woke up and then at night.

<< _Whats going on in wolf trap_ >>

<< _Nothing that’s the weird thing_ >>

Freddie waited for the other shoe to drop. The three of them were almost comically polite, everything bright and shiny and optimistic. Matthew didn't talk much to Freddie. He held her at arm's length with a lot of "yes, ma'am" and "no thank you, Ms. Lounds." He refused to call her Freddie and when he spoke of Will to her, he always called him "Mr. Graham."

Matthew was just one more mouth that needed to be fed, one more person who needed their turn in the shower. They all smiled at each other, took turns doing the dishes, made light conversation and were each in their own beds at a reasonable hour. She wondered if there was some subconscious chemistry between Matthew and Will that made them want to recreate the quiet discipline of the asylum.

Will and Matthew got along well. Will showed some annoyance when Matthew got into his fly-tying kit in an attempt to stave off boredom.

"You have to get back in to the water sometime, Mr. Graham," Matthew said as he watched Will put the materials back in order.

Will sighed and said "You're right. But you shouldn't touch unless you know what you are doing. I have a starter kit…" he lost the thread of what he was saying, then appeared to shake himself back. "I can give you a lesson. Let me get it."

Freddie threw down her book. She had only been half-reading it anyway. "Let me get it. Where is it?"

Will stopped with his hand on the front door knob.

"Its in the shed," he said, and went out.

 

That night Freddie waited until everyone went to sleep. It had been ten nights that she had waited to hear the key in the door. She was waiting, less and less patiently, for Will to slink back to her.

She didn't have a robe, so she threw a blanket over her shoulders and walked downstairs. When they saw her, the dogs jumped off the bed. They were used to showing her deference.  _At least I still rate in this pack_ , she thought. Will stirred.

"Hey," he said, but he was talking to the dogs.

Freddie hugged the blanket closer to herself. "Hey," she said.

"Are you here to kill me or fuck me?" he said, flopping his head back down on the pillow.

"I'm not sure, but I left my gun upstairs."

"Good sign for me."

She sat next to him on the bed.

"I think middle of the night pajama conversations are the best," she said.

"I agree," he said, his voice still blurred by sleep. "The defenses are down. Nifty bit of psychology there, Ms. Lounds. What am I supposed to spill in my semi-alert state?"

"Only everything," she said. "Start talking and I'll let you know when you're done."

He untangled his arms from the blankets and pulled her closer. She thought he was going to kiss her, but he just pressed his forehead to hers.

"I'm sorry, Freddie."

"For what, specifically, are you sorry?"

"I have fucked things up and I have no idea how to unfuck them," he whispered. "You are trapped. I put you in the trap."

"I trapped myself when I started digging into the Chesapeake Ripper," she said. "I wouldn't change that. I wouldn't be able to live with myself if I walked away just because things got hard."

"I want to tell you to leave, but I don't know where you can go. Hannibal can find you anywhere. But what happens if you stay here with me and Matthew? Can the three of us play happy house forever?  I care about you. You are important to me and I don't know how that happened, but it makes me so scared for you. Bad things happen to the people I love."

"You don't love me," she said, pulling away. "You feel guilty and responsible, you like the challenge of getting me to stop hating you and be on your side, and you enjoy my body and what it does to your body. You don't love me and I don't love you."

"I do love you."

"Do you love me as much as you love Hannibal?"

"I love you…differently."

"You don't love me, but I'm not going to try to convince you. You have talked yourself into normalcy."

She wouldn't let him kiss her on the mouth. She twisted away, the kisses landing on her neck and cheeks. She wasn't trying in earnest to get away, she just didn't want to give in so easily.

"Make love to me," he said into her ear.

"You're drunk."

"I'm not. I haven't had a drop. You can't blame my behavior on alcohol this time. Make love to me."

"I can't."

"Then fuck me."

"You are a dirty-mouthed, common man with delusions of grandeur."

"So?" he said. "Who are you waiting for? A gentleman of class and social standing who can wine and dine you and sweep you off your feet with his charm? I've had that and It's overrated."

 _You don't know what I want_ , she almost said.  _But he did. Damn it. He did_.

"I'm not waiting for anyone," she answered in all honesty.

He parted the blankets for her. She wriggled down into the warm cocoon and Will wrapped his arms around her snugly.

"It wasn't fair for me to tell you I love you. I should have said you are one of the people I love," he said.

"I'm not in the mood for semantic games, Will"

"I meant just what I said. I love a lot of people and you are included in that," he said. "I don't do well with the fine gradations of emotions. Their subtleties are hard for me to navigate on my own. I either push people away or draw them in in a way that can be obsessive and overwhelming. When love, I love absolutely, I love wholly, I love violently and so I try not to love."

He turned her face to him so he could kiss her on the lips, small delicate kisses. There was no neediness there, just gentleness. He was not trying to take anything from her.

"I would rather your mouth be anywhere else than my mouth," she said. "Its easier."

"I know," he said. "It's easier for us to fling venom at each other from across the room and then tear at each other with our teeth and nails. Hate is an easier thing to hold on to."

They kissed until she felt breathless. They weren't just alone in this corner of the house, they were alone in the world. For this one perishable moment they were safe because no one else existed.

 _This has to be the last time_ , she thought. And then they were fitting together, his mouth still on hers, still innocently kissing her like it was a first kiss, gentle fingers along the inside of her thighs, carefully easing into her like a first time lover.

 _This can't be the last time_.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title comes from the lyrics of a Barenaked Ladies song "Trust Me (to Let You Down)"


	10. White Knights and Warm Peaches

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Freddie and Will kiss and make up. This doesn't sit well with...well, everyone else.

It was just getting light out when Will got up to let out the dogs. He came back to bed chilled, letting a draft in under the blankets.

"Don't go out there, it's cold," he said.

Freddie warmed him up with her hands. Touching gave way to lazy kissing. Neither of them wanted to break the spell of the night before. She nibbled on Will's ear and he made a half-hearted attempt to wiggle away from her.

"Matthew is an early riser," Will said. "He likes to go for those early morning runs."

Freddie pretended not to have heard and Will pretended he hadn't said anything. She shifted her hip so she was half on top of him.

"Oh, we’re going to get caught," Will said.

Even still, they were in no hurry. The night before had been a fleeting thing and they knew they couldn't hold on to it forever, but by closing their eyes they could extend it maybe just a little longer. The memory of its perfection was exciting. Freddie wondered if Will's memory was sharper than hers. Could he slip back into his own mind and replay the past as fresh as the present? On the whole, she hoped not.

"What's it like?" she said, at the same time shifting her body fully on his and guiding his already-erect cock into where she was still soft and slick from the night before. "Is it better for you than the rest of us?" There wasn't any doubt about what she meant.

"Sometimes," he said. "Imagination can be good, or it can be overwhelming."

"Right now?"

"This is good," he said. "Perfect."

She sat up straight and shifted so he could go deeper into her. The sheets fell away from her and the cold made her pause like a dash of icy water.

They were suddenly laid bare to each other and she had a stomach-dropping moment when they just looked at each other. Neither of them moved. In the growing light she could see his dark hair against the white pillow, his flushed cheeks and neck and chest, and the scar, which was like a hasty underline or the flourish to a signature. An emphatic mark for the point being made. _There! I meant what I said, Will. Underscore and exclamation!_

At the same time he was seeing her. He never could quite get over that corona of red hair, backlit now by the window. For a moment she looked like an angel—more in the biblical sense: something fearsome with round unblinking all-seeing eyes and a flaming sword. The image only lasted for a moment. A cloud passed over the sun and the light became diffuse and his vision of her softened. With the drapes of his sheets around her legs she looked like classically sculpted marble. He wanted to kiss those perfectly shaped lips. _Cupid's bow, that shape was called_.

Will pulled her back down so he could kiss her, feel the warm length of her body against his. It wasn't the mechanics of having the deepest penetration possible that he wanted. It was this. He pulled out of her so he could touch her and when he felt her beginning to tremble, he entered her again. Feeling the soft waves of her orgasm encircling him (and the little spark in the back of his head that let him feel how warm and sweet it had been for her, like the taste of peaches), brought him to his own orgasm, the same sweetness.

Freddie felt satisfied, physically and emotionally, and now she just wanted to be. She reached out her hand and Will held it, threading his fingers between hers.

 

There were footsteps on the stairs, heavier than they needed to be. Warning footsteps and a throat clearing. The timing was suspicious. Almost as if Matthew had been waiting at the top of the stairs.

At the same time there was a knocking at the door. The outside world intruding.

The sound at the door wasn't fist-on-wood, but the tentative tapping of metal on glass.

_Tap. tap._

"Freddie? Freddie, are you there?"

Matthew came down the stairs and walked right to the door.

"There's someone at the door, Mr. Graham," he said. He flattened against the wall by the door so he could see out without being seen. "Looks like Dr. Chilton."

Will shrugged Freddie off his shoulder. "Hold on," he said to Matthew and then a louder "Hold on!" for the person at the door. He looked around for his pants. "I live out in the country for a reason," he said under his breath.

Freddie was still naked and as she stood up, she glanced over at Matthew. He looked away while making it clear by the tight and slightly disapproving look on his face that he wasn't doing it to be polite.

On the floor, Freddie found the oversized tee shirt she wore to bed and silently thanked her good luck that her panties were bright red and stood out in the tangle of bedding. She had just pulled the shirt down to cover her thighs when Will opened the door, letting in a gust of freezing air, Frederick Chilton and all the dogs. Frederick's eyes went right to Freddie and he looked both relieved and embarrassed.

"You didn't answer the phone," he said to Freddie.

"I—What?" she said.

"Your phone," he said. "You didn't answer any of my phone calls."

_The phone._ She had left it up in her room.

"You drove out here because I didn't return your phone calls in a timely manner?" Wanting her to check in with him was endearing, rushing down here because she didn't return his call was not.

"I almost called the police to perform a well check, but I didn't think some of your roommates would appreciate that."

"Call the house phone next time," she said.

"I did," he said. "I was hung up on and then got a busy signal all night."

"That was me," Matthew said, sheepishly, from his spot by the door. "I disconnected the phone. I didn't want anything to disturb Mr. Graham's sleep. It’s a precious thing, sleep. It renews the mind. You should know that, Dr. Chilton."

Freddie saw Frederick's one visible eyebrow jerk upward in surprise, but he recovered his composure quickly and lowered it. He had been occupied taking in the scene. It wasn't what he had been prepared to see—rumpled bed, Will's hair looking particularly unruly, Freddie wearing a tee shirt that barely covered her ass. He had overlooked Matthew standing against the wall near the door.

"Hello, Boss," Matthew said.

 Frederick planted his cane in front of him and put both hands on its knob. He almost looked posed to start a musical number.

"I'm not your boss anymore," he said. "'Dr. Chilton' will be sufficient."

Matthew pushed himself off the wall and made his languid way over to Frederick.

"Dr. Chilton, I've been curious. How's the hospital been since I've been gone?" he asked "My surveillance system work okay for you?"

"It was a lot less buggy after you left us," Frederick said. "The cameras and microphones stopped having those unexplained outages."

"Weird," Matthew said. He was looking at Frederick like he was something under a microscope. "Hey, I wanted to apologize for not giving my two-week notice." His words were conversational, but the flat way he delivered them was unsettling.

"I understand. The situation was out of your control…somewhat," Frederick said. "Congratulations on your freedom. I guess it doesn't matter what you've done as long as someone has done something worse by comparison."

Matthew smiled like this was a great joke. "If that's the way it works then it is lucky for all of us," he said. "Because I'm not the only one who got a reputation boost when compared to Dr. Lecter's bad deeds. Considering you hired me, Dr. Chilton, _my_ reputation boost is _your_ reputation boost. Inmates running the asylum and all. But now with me out of jail, my reputation polished up, maybe you _will_ get your job back."

"Matthew, you may have spent as much time in institution as I have and fancy yourself an expert on psychiatry, but it _does_ matter what side on the bars you were on."

"Is that right, Mr. Graham?" Matthew asked looking over at Will. "Dr. Chilton says it doesn't count if you are _in_ the cage."

Will shrugged, buttoning up his shirt with more concentration than the task needed. He wasn't about to be pulled into the conversation.

"While its been lovely catching up with you, Matthew, I came out to talk to Freddie."

"Outside," Freddie said. She was fuming mad and wanted to tear into Frederick, but not in front of Will and, especially, Matthew. She was mad at Frederick, but not so much that she would argue with him in front of Matthew.

Freddie put on Will's heavy canvas coat and stuck her bare feet into a pair of rubber boots and went outside with Frederick. The cold air chilled her bare legs, but she didn't anticipate a long conversation. A quick telling-off and sending Frederick on his way. His taxi was still idling outside _. Good, he'll need it_ , she thought.

 They walked away from the house. Will was watching them, leaning against the open doorway. Frederick laid a hand on her arm and leaned in to talk so he wouldn't be overheard.

"You really shouldn't sleep with Will."

She pulled her arm away.

"I mean, go ahead and have sex with him," Frederick said, "that's your business, but don't be unconscious in the same room with him. If your guard is down there should be a locked door between you."

Freddie stopped walking and stared angrily at Frederick.  "I asked for your advice once. _Once_. In a moment of weakness. That doesn't give you some kind of vested interest in my life. That doesn't give you the right to pull this white knight bullshit."

"I'm sorry you took it that way."

"What other way is there to take it?"

"When no one answered the phone I imagined the worst. And considering the kind of things I've personally seen, the worst I can imagine is pretty horrific."

They had seen a lot of the same things. Freddie managed to get her hands on a lot of crime scene photos, so she knew what he was talking about. Corpses, or parts of corpses that were so destroyed they were _things_ , no longer looking like the people they once were, barely looking human at all.

"I have this under control, Frederick," she said. " I don't understand why you even care. You know I'm involved with Will and you have made your disapproval very clear. I have no plans to change my living situations. I don't know why you don't just write me off."

"I admire you," he said.

Standing in the snow, almost naked except a borrowed lumberjack coat and a pair of olive green gumboots she didn't feel very admirable.

"They didn't tell me that you weren't really dead, you know," he said, his head down, the gaze of his single eye looking at the tip of his cane in the snow. "When the FBI had you in hiding. I mean, why would they? I wasn't part of the plan. I was still under suspicion. I was still the Ripper of record. They told Alana Bloom, but no one told _me_.  I tried to check myself out against doctor's orders to go to your funeral. I was still fighting to keep my eye, but I wanted to leave the hospital.  I beat myself up over missing your funeral. I went on thinking you were dead and thinking that Hannibal _and Will_ killed you and then did terrible things to your body. I'm having a hard time letting that go."

Frederick swallowed hard and continued to walk away from the house, looking down at his feet as he walked. "You saved my life. In the observatory. Everything about that day is a half-awake nightmare. I was in and out of consciousness, do you remember? I don't know how long it was after Gideon left and before the FBI got there. Minutes? Hours? During that time it was just the two of us. I watched your face while you pushed air into my lungs. You were so traumatized, but you stayed there, with all my viscera laid bare, not knowing if help was going to arrive or if Gideon was going to come back."

"I wouldn't have left you to die, Frederick," she said, stamping her feet to warm up. Her legs were pale and covered in goosebumps. "I _do_ have some basic human decency."

"I don't think anyone would have blamed you if you left me to die to save your own skin. I would have been little mourned or missed," he said. " _That_ is why I don't just write you off. _That's_ why I let you interview Will while he was under my care and _that's_ why I agreed to give you information about Alana Bloom's recovery, and _that's_ why I spent a night in this house. I didn't do it for Will. I did it for _you_. Because you asked me to."

 He frowned again. It was an expression Freddie was beginning to learn meant that he was struggling with how to phrase something personally painful. "No one else cares that you saved Frederick Chilton's life, but it matters to me.  Don't get me wrong, I appreciate a certain amount of your recklessness, especially when it saves my life, but you can't put yourself in needless danger and expect me not to care. I will respect your right to make your own choices, but I will still care."

Old Freddie would have just smiled mockingly, or played innocent and then used him for his connections. She hadn't given much thought to Frederick's feelings, but then, she usually didn't consider other people's feelings at all. She was barely getting used to considering her own feelings.

She reached out and hugged Frederick tightly.

"You have to trust me," she said. "I will always do what benefits me the most and right now its this."

His cane fell over in the snow as he dropped it to wrap his arms tightly around her. He was solid and warm and embraced her tightly enough that she felt it through the thick coat.

"I trust you," he said, pain in his voice. "I don't trust Will."

Behind them, the front door slammed.

 

Will watched as Freddie and Frederick talked. He was hoping to see Freddie give him a piece of her mind, but whatever Frederick had to say seemed to placate her. She listened as he spoke, even as she had to wrap her arms around herself to keep herself warm. Surprisingly, they ended the conversation with a long hug. Will would not have described either of them as "a hugger."

"Well that's interesting," said Matthew. He had come up behind Will and was watching over his shoulder.

Will closed the door harder then he meant to. Matthew watching Freddie and Frederick talk caused uncomfortable warning signals in Will, a warm itch at the base of his skull like an insect sting. Will went into the kitchen, hoping Matthew would follow, but Matthew stayed and looked outside through the front window.

 

Freddie stayed outside after Frederick's taxi drove off, trying to find the familiar place where she kept all her fury. It was still there, but it was small and compact, tucked in a corner of her chest. It was a relief to her to still find it there, ready when she needed it. Freddie had learned with Abigail that she could care and still be angry, but she didn't know how far she could stretch herself, how many people she could give a place in her heart and mind before she was too open. Was there room for Frederick, too? She thought so.

She could still hold on to her anger like the precious thing it was but she didn't need to stoke it with her whole self. It burned on its own. As long as Hannibal Lecter was still alive there was more than enough fuel for it. She gave in to feeling such a depth of hate, and in returnshe gained the ability to feel everything deeply--fear, but also love.

That was the gift Hannibal didn't even know he had given her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Slight amount of retconning here for the Freddie-Fred relationship but I like this direction a little better.


	11. A Bargain, A Gamble

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Freddie and Will go their separate ways for the evening. Freddie's night with Frederick takes an unhappy turn in a way that affects Will, too.

 

Matthew was agitated after Frederick's visit to the house, although Freddie didn't know if it was Frederick's visit or being slapped in the face with evidence of her and Will's resumed and continuing relationship. Gone was the affable lisping orderly. In his place was an icy disinterested schemer, cool and placid above with hot rage that would burst to the surface at erratic intervals, seemingly unrelated to anything external. In short, he fumed. He would slam drawers or go for solitary runs. His irritation boiled over. Will assured Freddie it wasn't anything serious, although he wouldn't give her details.

"I talked to him. He's unhappy about a lot of things right now," Will said cryptically. "It isn't about you. Its more between me and him."

It was hard to not think it was personal, when Matthew made a point of ignoring her, even when she spoke. When she was in his line of sight, she had the spooky feeling he looked right through her and could see objects on the other side.

So she was glad to have a night out, even if she and Will were going their separate ways. Will was going to have dinner with Margot. Freddie had not been invited. Instead of sulking at home with Matthew, Freddie set up a dinner date with Frederick. Matthew would be left alone in the house, but he seemed unusually cheerful about it. He watched Will help Freddie with her coat.

"You are going on dates with other people?" Matthew said, looking over the back of the couch, his head resting on his folded hands. "I thought you were dating each other."

"I'm not the jealous type," Freddie said and her look added _unlike some_ and she thought she saw Matthew's smile falter for just a moment.

Will walked Freddie out to her car and opened the door for her. She kissed him goodbye.

"Don't wait up," Freddie said.

"Should I be worried?" he asked, half-smiling. "You and Frederick together. It just  seems to be like too much cunning to be in the same room. It could be dangerous."

"He might say the same about you and me," she said.

"What does he say about us?" Will said. "I'm sure you have talked about it."

"Once you start telling me everything you talk about in my absence, then I'll return the favor," she said, sitting down behind the wheel. "If anyone should worry about date night it should be me."

"Worried about me and Margot? We're as platonic as two people who have slept together can be."

"Then why was I not invited?" Freddie asked.

Will got the guarded yet resigned look he developed when he was going to tell Freddie the person something he didn't want Freddie the journalist to know. He drummed his fingers on the car roof.

"Margot wants to talk about my legal strategy if I get charged in Randall's death. She has a right, since she's paying for my lawyers."

"Are you going to get charged?"

"I hope not. I haven't heard anything yet. Margot's not optimistic, though," he said. "You would like Margot. She's got a sharp mind. She's a planner."

"Some might call her a schemer," Freddie said. "You  don't. Not even after she tricked you."

"Financing my legal team is her way of apologizing," he said. "There isn't anything else to say."

Freddie didn't believe him. This wasn't a matter of a small broken promise. Margot had nearly trapped him into fatherhood, whether he wanted the baby in retrospect didn't matter.  But maybe it was like Frederick had said. It doesn't matter what you've done, as long as someone else has done something worse. Will had been hurt worse than what Margot had done to him, so Margot was forgiven. It was a bit of grace that covered Freddie as well.

"Do me a favor and ask her if she'll do an interview with me," Freddie said. "I still want to ask her about what happened to her brother. There's more there, I know it. Did she tell you anything?"

"We never talked about what happened to Mason," he said, and shut the car door.

Freddie picked up on the fact that Will had Margot's brothers name right on the tip of his tongue. He didn't even pause to remember it. And he had chosen his words very carefully in answering Freddie.

 

* * *

 

When Freddie arrived at Frederick's house it looked deserted.

The porch light was out, and she could see no lights in any of the windows. It didn't look like anyone was home. She rang the doorbell and then knocked on the door. She checked her phone, but the last text from him was there, confirming the date. She called and got no answer. She leaned her forehead on the frosted glass door, but it was impossible to see anything in the gloom of the house. She called again and listened to hear if the phone was ringing in the house.

Freddie was getting a little taste of how Frederick had felt when his phone calls went unanswered, but she didn't think it was intentional. He wouldn't give her a taste of her own medicine since he knew how bitter it was first hand.

Freddie started walking the perimeter of the house. She opened her purse and laid her hand on her gun, just in case.

 _What if he is in there and he didn't answer the door because he can't._  She pictured his plastic covered couches splattered with blood, a dark figure inside waiting silently. This kept her from picking the lock. This would be a great trap and she had fallen for it once before. She was considering her options when a taxi pulled up to the house.

Frederick got out of the taxi. He barely looked at her, almost shouldering her out of the way so he could get to the front door. He was trying to fit the key in the lock with shaking hands.

"Frederick," she said, and took the keys from him.

"I just need a damn drink," he said.

"Okay, okay," she said soothingly, unlocking the door and pushing it open. Her relief was turning back into alarm. He lurched inside ahead of her.

"What's wrong?" she asked.  He was over at the bar area of the kitchen, trying to hold steady enough without his cane to pour himself a drink. He realized he couldn't, set the bottle down carefully and then threw the glass he had been holding to the floor, where it shattered. He gripped the edge of the counter with both hands and rocked forward.

"Alana is dead," he said.

Freddie's hands were slightly steadier as she poured out two drinks.

 

Frederick had not just been getting information about Alana from his friend at the rehab facility, but had extracted a promise: if it ever looked really bad for Alana, he would call Frederick, and Frederick would stay with her until her family had time to get there. The family never knew he had been there; he slipped out before they came up to the room. Alana had pulled through the two other times Frederick had been called.  This time she declined so quickly, her family had no chance to get there. In the morning she had been awake and talking, by evening she was dead.

"It might have been a stroke," he said, holding his drink between his knees. "They won't know until the autopsy."

"That was a really decent thing you did for her."

"No one should die alone," he said. "We had our professional differences, but as a person I liked her immensely."

He rocked slightly. Freddie wasn't sure what to do. It was a fragile moment that could tip either into hysteria or total emotional detachment. 

"I can't do this anymore. I can't stay here," he said, indicating his surroundings with a dismissive wave of his hand. "This window-dressing, _literal window-dressing_ , is all self-delusion, no better than getting a make-over or buying a new outfit and thinking that will solve your problems. I have to leave. Leave this house, leave this city and all the damn people in it and all the memories of every shitty thing I've seen or heard of or been part of."

"I thought you weren't going to let Hannibal take your home away from you."

" _This isn't my home_. I never had a home. I have a house, Freddie, where I kept my things and where I sleep and I have my mail sent to, but it is not my home. I'm just kidding myself otherwise. I have no job, no friends…I have a life full of people like Matthew; people who wouldn't piss on me if I was on fire. At least he is honest enough about how much he loathes me. It's refreshing in a way to be _openly_ despised."

He finished his drink and set down the glass with exaggerated care, as if to make up for smashing the other one.  

"Today Hannibal won another round  _in absentia_. Alana Bloom was one of the best people I ever knew. Hannibal cared so little for Alana he was willing to destroy her, almost as an afterthought. He had everything. Success and friends and love, but all of it had so little value to him, he could shrug it off like an ill-fitting suit and walk away. No one could stop him he got away with it. He keeps winning."

"So far," she said.

"There is no justice, no karma. That's what I can't stomach any longer. If this is a contest to see who can pretend the hardest that they haven't been gutted one way or the other, I lose. I admit my defeat. I'm cashing in my chips and leaving the table."

He got up, a little unsteady on his feet. His shoe crunched on broken glass. He ground the heel of one hand into his eye, the other he pressed to the spot on his forehead above the eye patch. "I'm afraid I'll have to cancel our dinner. I don't feel like eating. I don't feel like talking. I want to take some pills and go to sleep."

 "I can stay. We don't even have to talk. I'll just stay."

She must sounded concerned, because he said hastily, "For fuck's sake, I'm not going to  _harm_  myself. I'm talking about leaving Baltimore, not this mortal coil." There was a subtle shift in his tone and when he spoke there was a new bitterness. "Offering to babysit me is kind, but you don't have to do me any favors. You have work to do tonight. You have to write about Alana. Break that news. You know who reads your blog. From your lips to Hannibal Lecter's ears."

"I've praised for my wide broadcast when it suits people's agendas," Freddie said. "When the FBI wants to get a message to the Ripper, they turn to me. When Will wanted to get in touch with his admirer, he turned to me. I don't apologize for being successful."

"You're career hurts as many people as it helps," he said.  

"I didn't kill her, Frederick," she said. "The problem you have is with Hannibal, not me."

 He looked around, at his half-composed house, and poured himself another drink. 

"I'm not one of those people who despise you, Frederick, openly or in secret. We've seen each other at our worst most vulnerable moments and agreed we still liked each other. Why are you attacking me now?"

"I'd rather you see me dead, cut open from stem to stern, than to see me like this!" he said.

"Vulnerable?"

"Pathetic," he said, "to be mourning someone who loved everyone but hated me. Alana let me sit with her in her last moments because she didn't know any better. If she had been in her right mind she would have kicked me out. She never would have let me sit at her bedside. In the end, she held my hand, thanked me for being with her...and called me Hannibal."

* * *

Freddie stayed up to wait for Will to come home from Margot's. She made mug after mug of hot tea, which then sat and grew cold. She needed to have something to do. Each time she poured out the tea and put the kettle back on. Will didn't come home any later than she expected, but it felt like she waited a long time. She didn't write the story about Alana. Will needed to know first and he needed to hear it from her. 

"You waited up for me?" Will asked, when he saw her there. He was smiling, greeting her with simple delight. "Were you worried I wasn't going to come back?"

"Will, sit down," she said.

He knew it wasn't good from the look on her face, and wouldn't sit.

"Frederick went to see Alana today. They think she may have had a stroke."

 "But she's going to be okay." He was taking his coat off so slowly, and hanging it up neatly. He reminded Freddie of Frederick setting down his glass. He has the same total absorption of someone who is trying to shut out their own clanging thoughts by focusing on their physical actions.

"No. She isn't," Freddie said.

"No. She's going to be okay." He said it as a statement not a question, as if he could talk over her and make his version reality, instead of hers.

"She died, Will. She's gone. I'm sorry."

Will paced, just as Frederick had a few hours before.

"We had a deal," he said. Freddie was confused. Did he think she was lying to him?

"I never went to visit her. Not once," he said. "And that was the deal. I was tainted, but I made a gift of my absence, and in return she was supposed to live. She was supposed to escape Hannibal Lecter."

"You don't get to make that deal."

"Why not, Freddie?" Tears stood out in his eyes. His voice was strained.

"You aren't God," she said.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's note: I know that Hannibal did not push Alana out the window. This is not a mistake. But none of the other characters know. They just assume Hannibal did all the attempted murdering himself. Will might be able to know it, but he has shown he has a major Abigail blind spot in the past.


	12. Two More in the Eye for Death

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will and Freddie attend a funeral. Will seeks comfort in just about every way he can, with varying success.

Alana had gone to Freddie's  funeral and now Freddie was returning the favor.

On the day of Alana's funeral, the weather took the final turn into spring. The air was fragrant with blossoms that sprung up overnight. It wasn't the heavy perfume of a funeral wreath, but light and bursting with life. Snow remained only on the shoulders of the road, diminished and dirty.

Freddie wore the blue and black outfit she had worn to court for Will's trial. If he noticed, he didn't comment on it, but Freddie doubted he noticed. For his funeral attire, Will reached into the depths of his closet and took out a nice deep burgundy button down shirt, charcoal slacks and a tie in a subdued diagonal stripe. They weren't his usual style.  They were from the Hannibal Collection section of his wardrobe, one that didn't get touched very often.  It was a shame, Freddie thought, he looked almost stylish but it wasn't a look he would often adopt.

Freddie and Will were as low profile as they could be at the funeral, seating themselves in the back row of the church. Will's eyes drifted to the front where Alana's family was sitting.  Her father, who was built like a former football player, sobbed into his hands, while a small willowy woman who could only be Alana's mother put her hand on his shoulder and then his knee.  Will wondered if Alana's parents were still married or if it was just this tragedy in their family that brought them together. He realized her was watching their interactions too closely instead of listening to the service so he made himself stop and focus.

 Frederick was there in the pew right behind Alana's family. Kade Prurnell was also there, representing the FBI's condolences. When she saw Will and Freddie were there, she looked daggers at them. Prurnell must have told Alana's brothers who they were because they watched him with hostile glares when the service let out. Will was eager to go home.

"We need to go to the cemetery," Freddie said "I need pictures."

"Of course you do," he said sourly. He was wearing sunglasses, although the day wasn't that bright. "I'll drop you off and wait down the block. I'm not going to be a welcome guest."

"Neither am I," she said, "but I'm not going to let that stop me."

Her sassy, slightly self-effacing humor usually got a rise out of him, but not this time. She couldn't see his eyes behind the sunglasses, but she had little doubt they were as blank as the lenses that faced her.

At the cemetery, Freddie tried to walk quietly in heels that clacked on the cement pathway. She saw the knot of mourners and doglegged around to get a wide shot.

Frederick noticed Freddie taking photos and edged away from the group. Freddie assumed Frederick didn't want to be in the photographs, but he kept making his way over to her, conspicuous in his attempt to be casual. _How did he ever gamble?,_ Freddie thought. _His poker face is shit_. Thankfully, everyone was focused on the grave and he didn't draw any attention her way.

"I'm surprised you didn't take your pictures in the church," he said.

"Who says I didn't?" she said, camera snapping. Then she remembered he had known Alana a lot better than she had. "I'm sorry," she said.

"Thank you," he said. "And I'm sorry I lashed out at you the other night. I was still in shock, but that isn't an excuse. I behaved atrociously."

"I've had worse things hurled at me," she said. "You basically said I was too good at my job."

"Be that as it may, with all my emotional outbursts, I fear that I didn't express myself very well. I am still leaving Baltimore and you can come with me. I stand by my offer."

"You made me an offer?" she said. "Ah, that's right. Coffee beans in Costa Rica."

"Or something like that," he said. He was talking quickly glancing towards the gravesite.  "I have an 8 am flight out of Dulles on Tuesday of next week.  I purchased two tickets. Round-trip. I intend to return eventually, but I need a vacation and I am inviting you to join me. To be so crass as to mention money, let me make it clear I will foot the bill for everything, for the both of us."

"What do you get in exchange? A 'companion' bought and paid for?"

"Of course not. My offer is absolutely platonic." He stood straighter and puffed out his chest in a way that reminded Freddie of a small indignant bird. "You aren't even my type. I like my women blonde and frivolous and you are neither. "

Freddie snapped a few more pictures. Alana's father couldn't bring himself to throw the rose he was holding into the yawning grave and dropped it, his knees giving out underneath him. The wind bore towards her the sounds of the slight commotion as his sons rushed forward to support him.

"Just…consider it, okay?,"  Frederick said. " The tickets have already been purchased. You'll either be with me, or I'll have room to stretch out and not have to fight anyone over the armrest. You can change your mind any time until the plane takes off. Keep your passport on you. If you decide at the last minute to come with me, that's all you really need. Everything else we can pick up on the way."

"That plane isn't really heading to Costa Rica, is it?"

"Since that is the one place I named, it is the last place I would actually go," he said. "Let's agree to call our destination a whimsical spur-of-the-moment surprise, rather than a symptom of my intractable paranoia."

"That's so generous, Frederick, really," she said. "But I can't."

"No offense, but if you are staying around for Will, your relationship has a tendency to run hot and cold," he said. "What's good right now might not be so good by next Tuesday. So there's no harm in keeping your options open. Incidental, how is he dealing with Alana's death? Is he processing it in a healthy way?"

"I'm not going to talk about Will's emotional state with you."

 Frederick took something out of his pocket. "Let me give you one other option. Here's a key to my house. Even if you don't want to come with me, you should have somewhere else to stay. My house is yours for as long as I'm gone. "He folded her fingers over the key. It was warm. Frederick had been holding on to it, nervous, perhaps, about this conversation. "Please keep this key safe. The thought of my house key in the reach of your roommates while I'm still living there is disconcerting to say the least."

She reached down the front of her shirt and tucked the key into the cup of her bra.

"Well that secures it from _one_ of them," he said. "I'm assuming."

She shrugged. Frederick turned away and started to walk off, but she stopped him.

"What's in it for you?" she said. "Paying my way and not wanting anything in return."

"A clear conscience," he said. "You're the only one left I'd feel guilty about if you wound up dead."

* * *

Will was waiting for Freddie, leaning against his car, pulling on a flask she hadn't known he'd had.

"You'll have to drive," he said, shaking the flask. It was empty enough to slosh when he shook it.

"You needed a little help to get through?"

"I can't go to therapy. I might as well self-medicate."

While Freddie drove, Will leaned his head against the passenger window. With his sunglasses on, Freddie couldn't tell if he was sleeping or even passed out.

"Can you take the sunglasses off, please? It isn't even sunny," she said.

He whipped them off and threw them in the direction of the dashboard. They bounced and landed on the floor mat.

"Happy now?" she asked. "Got that out of your system?"

He pinched the bridge of his nose, his eyes screwed shut.

"I didn't ask you to come," he said.

"I don't need your invitation, or permission, to cover a story."

 "I keep forgetting what is to me the funeral of a friend is just another day at the office for Freddie Lounds.  Did you get any good pictures of someone breaking down in tears or was everyone too stoic in the face of tragedy? Make sure you do a full fashion breakdown on what everyone wore. You could do a whole sidebar on the latest fashions in mourning attire. Is black the new black for funeral couture?"

"I don't even cover fashion," she said, turning in her seat to look at him although he wasn't looking at her.  "I run a crime blog and Alana's death is news, whether you like it or not. She is the latest victim of the Chesapeake Ripper. Other newspapers and blogs are covering this. If I don't that doesn't change anything. It doesn't change the facts."

He looked out the window.

"Every loss takes something irreplaceable away," he said. "Once you have someone in your life, you can't replace them. If you don't know someone you can't miss them when they are gone. It was easier when all I had was my dogs, my house and my teaching job. I didn't have much, but it was secure. I shouldn't have let Jack borrow my imagination."

"It wasn't Jack's fault you have an imagination to borrow," she said. "You don't really think your little world was that secure. If it was, you wouldn't be running away from yourself every few years."

"Shake your fists at the sky, but don't blame Jack Crawford," Freddie turned back to watch the road. "I can't believe I'm going to say this, but don't even blame Hannibal Lecter. You can blame him for the acts he committed, and they are many, but you can't blame him for who you are. You existed, with your imagination, long before he came into your life."

"I never thought you would defend him."

"What he has done is bad enough. But people should only be on the hook for their own sins."

They drove the rest of the way in silence.

***

Matthew was waiting for them, or rather he was waiting for Will and Freddie happened to come home at the same time.

"I made some sandwiches," Matthew said. "Nothing fancy, but they'll keep if you don't feel like eating right now."

"What kind of sandwiches?" Freddie asked. She hadn't felt like eating that morning, but now she was hungry.

"Turkey and cheese or ham and swiss," he said.

"I don't eat meat."

"I forgot," he said with a smile that told Freddie he hadn't.

"I don't feel like eating, Matthew, but I appreciate the thought," Will said.

"You should have something in your stomach," Freddie said, thinking of the half-full flask.

"Thank you, but no," Will said, wrenching off his tie and dropping it on the table.

Will went up to Freddie's room, which had lately become their room. After that one time, they mutually agreed that nights spent together should not be in the common living area.

Freddie made a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for herself and ate it standing in the kitchen.

"Is Mr. Graham going to be alright?" Matthew asked.

"As alright as can be expected," Freddie said icily.

"Maybe I should go up and talk to him."

"I'll go, thanks." Freddie set her plate in the sink.

"I wish I could have gone to the funeral, but Mr. Graham said it would have been too distracting for us to show up together."

"Did you ever meet Alana Bloom?" Freddie asked.

"She kind of yelled at me once," he said, "but I was trying to kill her boyfriend, so…not the best introduction. Still it's sad."

"I don't know why you would care."

"Somebody died, Ms. Lounds," he said. "Life is precious."

Freddie piled a few of Matthew's sandwiches on a plate and brought it upstairs. There was an unwritten rule in the house: only the cheapest food they could find. Store brand, all the way. The less preparation time needed, the better. Will, when he ate, wanted food that had popped out of a nugget-shaped form at a factory and hadn't been touched by human hands until one of them dumped it on a plate and put it in the microwave. Matthew, thanks to his institutional background was a genius at whipping up meals that looked like they came from the finest prison kitchens, anonymous and soulless. His sandwiches were on plain spongy white bread, with not even a wilted piece of lettuce or thin watery tomato to liven it up. The sandwiches looked so sad on the plate, Freddie put some baby carrots next to them. That was the extent of the garnishing Will would tolerate. Nothing fancier than a grade school cafeteria.

She took the plate up to the bedroom. Will sat on the edge of the bed, shoes off and one sock off. He was sitting there, holding his one sock, as if his mind had come to a full stop without any warning. Freddie put the plate on the nightstand and then went around and knelt in front of Will. She took his still-clad foot and put it in her lap.

"Need help?" she said.

"No," he said. "I'm just tired. I haven't been sleeping."

In the few days since Freddie broke the news about Alana, Will had been thrashing around in his sleep and having nightmares that he wouldn't talk about. He offered to sleep downstairs so as not to disturb her, but she was reluctant to let him be down there alone.

"Drinking doesn't help," she said, annoyed by her own slightly-nagging tone.

"I only had a few sips," he said. "I've done enough drinking to know how much will just dull the edges."

Freddie rolled his sock off and took the mate from his slack hand.

"You'll feel better when you take this off," she said, "this costume." She took his hands in hers and encouraged him to stand up. She started to undress him and he didn't protest.

"I don't suppose Alana meant anything to you," he said.

"I didn't get a chance to know her well," Freddie said. "I don't think she wanted to get to know me."

"She thought you lacked boundaries."

"If she meant the boundaries of what is socially acceptable to ask people about, then I agree with her. Sometimes you play nice-nice, but you have to be willing to push people." She thought on the conversation she had had with Alana and how coldly furious those blue eyes had looked. Really it was a shame that hadn't had more time to get to know each other. Once they were on the same side, they would have been a force to be reckoned with.

Freddie tapped Will's leg so he would step out of his pants. When he was stripped down to a t-shirt and boxers he finally looked like himself again. She helped him into bed. She looked at the black and red fabric piled on the floor and nudged it under the bed with her foot. She undressed herself, remembering Frederick's key (which she wrapped in her panties and stuck in her shoe) and got into bed next to him. He absently put his arm around her. She could feel his relax and he nuzzled the back of her neck.

"You got to know her better than I did. What was she like?"

"Caring, loving, smart, insightful," he said. "I kissed her once."

"You told me."

"She didn't want to get involved with me because I was unstable."

"Well she wasn't wrong," Freddie said.

"But then she…" he trailed off in an exasperated exhalation. "I have to remind myself how believable Hannibal's mask was to everyone. We have the luxury of hindsight, but not everyone survived long enough to reflect…I…I'm sorry, This is morbid."

Freddie turned in bed so they were face to face.

"We just came from the funeral of a friend," Freddie said.  "There isn't a time more appropriate than right now."

"I don't want to talk," he said. He kissed her, one hand on the nape of her neck, the other on the small of her back, pushing her toward him. She tugged at his boxers with one hand and he lifted his hip so they could slide off.

"This is so wrong," he said without any real conviction behind the words.

"Remember our first time together? Death has always been our aphrodisiac. No use feeling guilty about it now. That was all about feeling alive in the face of death."

"Our own deaths, not someone else's."

"We think about the person who died, but we also think about us, the ones who are still alive."

He hummed his assent "mm-mm" against her skin.

He kissed down her neck. He was remembering their first time together, when he got the first taste of her.  He had taken a panicked refuge in her. In defiance of the odds and Hannibal's strength of will she had survived, and he wanted that. He himself had only survived because Hannibal wanted it to be so. This thought had tormented him in his hospital bed, and for a time he wanted to die just out of spite, to deny Hannibal something he wanted.

Hannibal wanted him to suffer, and every moment he didn't, in his newly resurrected state, it was a victory.

Time with Freddie wasn't exactly happiness. There was a deep vein of unhappiness that ran through their relationship, but there was an absence of suffering, a temporary shelter in the tumult of his life. There was too much water under the bridge for there to be happiness, but there were times where that could be forgotten. Times like these when he could be between her legs, testing the flesh of her inner thigh lightly with his teeth. He never got tired of this spot, the beautiful blank canvas that led him on both sides to her center.

He kissed her there, on her inner thighs and then on her cleft. He parted her with his tongue. She never failed to be amazed at his enthusiasm. Familiarity with her had not dulled his carnal appetite for her. As time went on he had become more attuned to her and could tell from the slightest rocking of her hips or change in breath what he needed to do.  He brought her to the edge several times but the third time she knew he was going to bring her off because he slipped his finger insider her to feel her pulsing around him. She gasped, a sudden cry and curled forward so she could run her fingers through his hair.

He let her catch her breath for a moment and then crawled on top of her, thrusting himself into her roughly. It didn't matter. She was wet and open. Inviting. She wrapped her legs around him so he could go just a little further. He moaned loudly. He said her name. "Yes. Freddie, fuck yes."

He stopped moving inside her. She could feel  the taut barely restrained energy.

"What's wrong?" she asked, but he answered by pulling back enough so he could touch her again. She was going to tell him it felt nice but there wasn't any point…and then she felt the jolt of her own returning desire. She pushed herself against his fingers and he moaned because she was sliding up and down him again, these slight movements magnified by his own arousal.

Freddie could be a loud lay, but that was only for the theater of it when the situation called for a convincing act. When she did things her way, she was quiet, almost dignified in her near-silent focus. Now, she had already used up whatever restraint she had. Overlaying Will's guttural moans she heard a half-shriek half-laugh that she took a moment to realize was her own voice. Too far gone, she let herself go in a way she never had, would never had allowed herself to. Dirty talk was easy, but…

"Oh, Will. Will. Yes."

 

***

 

When she woke up in the middle of the night, it took a moment for reality to come back to her. Alana was dead, the funeral was like a dream. Will was gone, but the spot where he had been was still warm. She could hear him moving in the hallway. There was a light tapping on a door, but not hers, the one across the hall. She heard a murmur of voices and the sound of Matthew's door opening and closing. She went to her own door and opened it just a crack. The light under the door was on and she could hear Matthew and Will talking. She couldn't make out much of what was being said, just a word  floating up out of context here or there. Then, suddenly, she heard Will clearly. The light from under the door was blocked. He was standing right on the other side of it facing out. If it wasn't for the door, Freddie would have been able to stretch out her arm and touch him.

"We can work this out, in a way that everyone gets something they want."

Matthew must have turned towards Will, because she heard him clearly too. "Everybody?"

"In a way," Will said. "Everyone will get something they deserve."

Matthew laughed, a short stifled bark of a laugh. "I love the way you think. I love it…"

Freddie heard Will lock the door from the inside. After waiting a few minutes and hearing nothing more, Freddie shut her door and went back to bed. She woke once more during the night. All the lights in the house were off and everything was quiet. She was still alone.


	13. A Return to the Fundamentals of Journalism

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Freddie gets back to work and gets her hands on some information. Will has a broken teacup moment.

Freddie's stomach roiled. She had already stopped the car and now she got out and walked on the shoulder. She paced a tight circle. The fresh air wasn't helping so she decided not to fight it. It didn't take much encouraging from the finger down her throat to bring it all up: bile, semen and the dregs of the coffee she drank before the meeting. She spat into the grass, rinsed her mouth out with diet coke and spat again. The acid burned her throat.

She and her source had negotiated the deal over the phone.  Minimum of two thousand dollars, up to five thousand, depending how good the information was. He was a paralegal in the Federal Prosecutor's office. He didn't want to give his name. He just needed a little extra money.  Some big charges were coming down the pike, he told her, but they wanted all their ducks in a row before they sprang them. He had memos and copies of emails, unredacted.

Freddie paid for the hotel room where they met. She picked a cheap one on purpose because a guy like this wasn't just in it for the money. He wanted to feel dirty. She could see it in the way he knocked on the door and kept his head ducked down until he got in the room. His heart was hammering but his face showed nothing but excitement. He was an adrenaline junkie who was running out of things that could spike his blood pressure. Lucky for Freddie.

He handed her one memo out of a thick file as a show of good faith. She read: "Due to the ongoing collusion between Graham and Brown, it is crucial to arrest them simultaneously and deny them access to each other. The suspects currently live at the same address although the exact nature of their relationship is unclear."

"Are the rest like this?" she asked. "If they are, you get the whole five thousand and a promise of more if you can keep delivering."

His look was keen, but it wasn't greed that brightened up his eyes. He sat on the edge of the bed, ankle crossed over his knee. He loosened his power-red tie. _A little showy for the prosecutors office_ , Freddie thought.

"You keep me happy and I'll keep you happy," he said. "You can keep your money."

"That wasn't our deal," she said. "We settled on cash. You can't change the terms now."

"I didn't know everything you had to put on the table. You were holding out on me, Red."

He unzipped his pants and took out his half-hard cock. He ran his hand over himself, as an enticement, she supposed. "The happier you make me, the happier I make you. Okay?"

There was a glint in her eyes, too, picturing an open tap of information flowing into her cupped hands. Words on the page, money in the bank.

"Okay, " she said. "We have a deal."

She got on the floor in front of him.

"Like you fucking mean it."

"Give me a chance. You'll see how well we can work together."

 

As he tucked himself back into his pants, Freddie looked through the file. Some of it was trash, just filler, but there was some gold buried in there. Certainly worth what she had just paid him.

Checking the file in the room had been a mistake in retrospect. It allowed the man to get between Freddie and the door. He was a big man, and he was in her way.

"How about my two thousand?" he said.

"You told me I could keep my money."

"We agreed on two thousand as a baseline," he said. "C'mon this could cost me my job. I'm not walking out of here with nothing."

_Nothing? How soon they forget._

She didn't want to piss him off, not when he could be an ongoing source, but she didn't want him to take her for a chump. She bargained him down to $1500, and he counted the money before he would step aside from the door. They parted on good terms, as far as he knew.

Freddie left the room alive and unharmed, with thirty-five hundred dollars cash in her purse, a bitter taste in her mouth and a file full of confidential documents. She didn't feel her nerves until she was in the car driving away, shaking from the adrenaline of fear and excitement.

She drove a little way away from the hotel and stopped at a side street to take a better look at the documents. She quickly figured out the name of her anonymous source. "Damon L. Perry" was the only name that appeared on almost every document as sender, receiver or as CC'ed. _Dumb asshole_ , she thought.

One memo caught Freddie's eye because it had her name on it. It had been drafted by Damon L. Perry and it laid out the pros and cons of charging Freddie with conspiracy at the same time Will and Matthew would be arrested. According to this, Perry favored letting Freddie stay free because "she has already shown a willingness to cooperate with law enforcement on issues of questionable ethics and legality."

She skipped down and read:

_Lounds should be treated with suspicion until she does give tangible benefits to the prosecution. While I have severe doubts about her loyalty it would be beneficial to leave her at liberty. We can always keep the option to charge her on the back burner, if she doesn't seem inclined to be as malleable as we would like._

At the bottom of the memo was a handwritten note

_\---Why is this even an issue re: Lounds' willingness to testify v. Graham? She already testified against G. in open court! She tore him a new asshole. Graham would have gotten the chair if "someone" didn't kill the judge.–Kyle_

_\---Kyle, b/c now he's tearing her a new asshole. Haha. He's fucking her. I guess the best way to shut up a bitch is to shove your dick down her throat, right? –D_

After she read that, she desperately needed some fresh air.

 

When she got home she was still shaking. Her nerves were raw and her stomach painfully empty. She thought about stopping to eat but she pushed on. She just wanted to get home and show Will the file so they could strategize their next move.

When she walked in the door it looked like all hell had broken loose.

When she left this morning, Matthew and Will were talking in the kitchen, gossiping about BSHCI staff. Now Matthew was alone cleaning up a puddle of blood on the kitchen floor. Will was nowhere to be seen.

Freddie took in the scene in one glance, and took out her gun.

“What the hell happened?” she demanded.

 _This is,_ she though. _He's killed Will._  She didn't know why.  The pieces she had weren’t fitting together. She didn’t have _enough_ of the pieces.  

Matthew had been so nice lately.  He had become so solicitous in Will's pain, doing little things for him. Cooking dinner, or taking care of the dogs when Will was distracted or just putting a glass of water by his elbow as he read. Will took notice of it and thanked him in glances and smiles.  Whatever had made Matthew so moody was gone. It made Freddie suspicious, but Will shrugged it off

"He's a caretaker," Will told Freddie when she brought it up. "He might not always go about it the right way, but Matthew has a good heart."

Freddie could think of a dozen ways a conversation in the kitchen could turn violent. She had very little idea of how Matthew's mind worked. Her thoughts rushed, but she kept the gun on Matthew. Whatever else was going on, she know that she needed to do that.

Matthew got up slowly from the crouch he had been in.

“Its okay, “ he said and put up his hands. There was blood on the knees of his pants.

"It is not fucking okay," she said. Her arms shook the more she tried to keep them still. "Where is Will?"

"He's upstairs, cleaning up his hand," Matthew said. “We were washing up and Mr. Graham cut himself. It started out as an accident.”

“What do you mean started out?”

“He got himself into a little bit of a state,” he said. He was using the tone of voice she imagined he honed on a hundred irrational patients to talk them down from their horrors.  “He was upset. I cleaned up the broken glass, put away all the knives, just in case…" He shrugged, more used to people hurting themselves than Freddie was.

Freddie wasn’t satisfied, but Matthew felt he had explained enough and continued to clean up the blood, smiling a little to himself. Freddie could see now there wasn’t as much blood as she initially thought. It had been mixed in with soapy water that had sloshed out of the sink. She went upstairs to check on Will, watching all the while that Matthew was not following her up.

"Don't bother him," Matthew called after her. 

Will was upstairs as Matthew had said, winding gauze around his hand. There was blood splashed on the leg of his pants and the bottom hems were wet.

Will had his foot braced on the closed lid of the toilet, so Freddie sat on the edge of the sink. "Need help?" she asked.

"No," he said. He tucked the end of the gauze and then flexed his fingers, wincing, but able to move them.

"What happened?" she asked.  The gauze wrapping held Will's continued interest as he picked at it instead of making eye contact.

"How was your meeting?" he asked. "Did your source come through?"

"Yes and don't change the subject."

"I broke some dishes," he said, still tucking the gauze. "One was an accident and then, I got on a roll."

"You just thought it would be fun to smash some plates?"

"Not fun, per se." He scratched at the blood on his pants. "I got a letter today. It made me feel angry and frustrated and…destructive."

"From who?"

He finally looked up at her. It was a question that didn't really need asking.

"Do you still have it? Let me see it," she said.

"Matthew has it," Will said. "He has all of them."

 

Matthew was wadding up pink-tinted paper towels and shoving them into the trash.

"Did you bother him?" he asked Freddie.

"The letters. Give them to me."

Matthew gritted his teeth and shoved the last handful of paper towels into the trash.

"So you did bother him."

He sighed and took his time washing his hands and drying them. Then he took a note out of his pocket.

"Dear Will…" it started. It was so obvious who the letter was from that Freddie heard the voice in her head as she read.

Matthew patiently picked up the letter she hadn't realized she had dropped and pressed in into her hand. "Go on. I'm right here."

_Dear Will,_

_I can feel your pain across the miles, and I can feel every mile between us. There is a tether than connects us still. You used to feel that you and the Ripper were doing the same things at the same time, separated by space only, but connected by a mind and a will, a singular force of intention.  That is still true. It has never been more true than it is now.  You hate me and I can feel that most strongly. The irony is that I feel most connected to you when you hate me. Murderous thoughts bring us closer, even and perhaps especially if they are directed towards me. Do you expect me not to feel your hate? It connects us._

_A new hatred has sent its insidious tendrils into our consciousness. I take no particular joy in Alana Bloom's death. I was interested to see how far her bravery would take her. Too far, as it happened, and not far enough. My fondness for her was not diminished by the night of the incident  any more than my feelings for you were diminished. Changed, perhaps, but not diminished in intensity._

_It is heartening to know I have what amounts to surveillance of Baltimore, thanks in no small part to Ms. Lounds. I saw you outside of the church at Alana's funeral, but not at the graveside. I found that curious. I've never been one for funerals. I keep the reverence for the dead in my own ways._

_Does Ms. Lounds find it tiresome to be your sounding board yet? I am sure in your rough-hewn way you are often inconsiderate of her, although of all the people we know she probably deserves it the most. Still, who of us has gotten what they deserve? I ask you to give her my regards, while at the same time I acknowledge that you won't and forgive you this lapse._

_When the days turn mild I can't help but think of what might have been, and what still could be. When summer comes will you fish again? I encourage you to resume your hobby, despite the unpleasant associations. Wade into the river and enjoy the peace there. When you get the satisfaction of actually landing your prey, you can open it up yourself, take it from stream to the pan to the plate. It can sate your hunger. The very purity of its pale creamy flesh shows it isn't hiding anything._

_Do you subscribe to the multiverse theory? There is a universe where we are both dead and Alana is alive. There is a universe where you are sitting next to me, satisfied instead of in torment, and another where you are with me, smiling, but planning revenge. We are here, wherever we are, and we live with our choices in this universe. I take solace in that and hope you can as well._

It was signed with a flourish.

"Son of a bitch," Freddie said.

"I know," Matthew said, and slipped the pages out of Freddie's hand. "They were all like this. Pompous gasbag."

Freddie could feel for herself that tight knot of fear, for Will and for herself.

"Usually I get to the mailbox first," Matthew said. "That's why I always walk the dogs in the afternoon. I always bring in the mail. If there is any trash like this, I dispose of it. Our mail came early today and I didn't get to it in time. Will got there first and this was waiting for him."

“He has to know that you are screening his mail," she said.

"If he doesn't see the letters he can pretend they don't exist," he said. "Before I offered my services, he had a whole stash of them in a shoe box out in the shed."

She thought of the nights Will had gone out to the shed and she added the image of him, sunk in melancholic drunkenness reading and re-reading a letter. Sometimes he would be convincing himself he was looking for clues. Only at his most intoxicated he would have dropped that pretense.

"What did you do with them?" she asked.

"I burned them. There isn't any need to keep them and read them over and over," Matthew said, defensively. " Looking for evidence on those letters is like entering into a discussion. It’s a dialog with the Ripper. You start tracking down the stamps, running DNA, looking for fingerprints, trying to trace the paper and ink--for what? Follow the clues and you go on a wild goose chase.  Where does it end? He's back in your head."

"Tell me what happened," she said, eyes still scanning the room, looking for something that wasn't right.  "Will read the letter…"

"He came in and started helping me with the dishes," Matthew said. "He looked a little jittery. Then he knocked over a glass and he just lost it. He started smashing things on the floor. His hand was an accident, like I said. He got a cut from broken glass. Then he told me what was wrong. I made him give me the letter then I sent him upstairs to get cleaned up."

Will had lied to her, for months, by not telling her about these letters.  She wondered how long Hannibal had been telling Will to give his regards to Ms. Lounds.  Will hadn't told Freddie about the letters, even when Matthew found out. He  trusted Matthew with this secret. Matthew was part of Will's world in a way Freddie couldn't be. She could be affected by this world, but she had so little power to make changes in it. She could observe and report, but her power stopped there. The very truths she uncovered endangered her.

She remembered the file folder of papers she had so recently purchased, and felt a sudden relief and gratitude that Matthew had destroyed all the letters from Hannibal. She didn't know what was in them, but she did know she didn't want the likes of Damon L. Perry and Kade Prurnell to have them. Hannibal was a pompous gasbag, but he was careful. There wouldn't be anything in those letters that wouldn't be just as damaging to Will. Even this one, saying they shared "a singular force of intention." What would Damon L. Perry make of that?

"In twenty minutes, I'm calling a house meeting," Freddie said, "In the meantime, get rid of that letter."


	14. Red and Brown Plaid Sheets

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Freddie, Will and Matthew have a house meeting. Freddie gives Matthew a chance to openly express how he feels about his living condition. Now its time to talk about what Matthew wants.

Freddie had Will and Matthew's attention. 

"I'm not calling this meeting to scold you for keeping Hannibal's letters from me. I'm worried about a more immediate danger. This might be the last night we spend outside of prison walls," she said. She handed Will and Matthew each a document at random and then spread the rest of the papers out on the abandoned living room bed. 

"These come from a source inside the justice department," she said, as the men looked at the papers. Matthew sat on the bed and starting sorting through. Will kept his injured hand in his pockets and circled around the bed without touching, reading only what someone handed to him. The three of them read and passed papers to each other, mostly in silence, but occasionally Matthew made a disbelieving groan as the totality of the situation hanging over their heads began to settle in.

Because it was all there. Every crime the police could conceivably charge them with, from murder all the way down to some checks that Matthew bounced years ago and never made good on.

Freddie felt her heart drop as looked over an email exchange that discussed whether Frederick Chilton was an accomplice or just incompetent. Damon L. Perry thought they should threaten him with charges too. Matthew found a description of the time he spent institutionalized. He had been there under an alias, but it didn't matter. They found it out.

Matthew crumpled the paper and crushed it to his chest. 

"Will…" Matthew said. Will tried to silence him with a look and a small shake of his head, but it didn't work.  "What are we going to do?"

"We aren't going to do anything." Will started gathering up all the papers within reach. "It's a set up. They are trying to scare us into doing something stupid."

"This doesn't look like a set up," Matthew said. "This looks very real."

"It does," he said. "It's convincingly thorough. And yet…Freddie, how much did you pay this source for the information?"

"Two thousand," she said, "more or less."

"This is worth maybe ten times that," Will said. "This source didn't only risked getting fired. He could be arrested for leaking this kind of information, and he did it for a few thousand dollars? Look what's here. There's information about all of us here, with information about Dr. Chilton added in for good measure. They are throwing everything at the wall and trying to see what sticks. They are trying to get us to crack and turn on each other. That's the message here. Save yourself. Rat out the other guy before its too late."

Freddie met Matthew's eye and saw the same doubt she felt reflected in his face.

"I know how cops think, too," Will said to their silent doubt. "They think Freddie will post her story and then we will panic. If we stick together and stay quiet, they don't have anything."

"They have something," Matthew said, holding out the crumpled paper he still had clutched in his hands.

"We shouldn't make any rash decisions," Will said. "It's the same thing Hannibal is trying to do with his letters. They are trying to have us flushed out of shelter so they can take potshots at us as we scramble. We need to hunker down and not be frightened by loud noises and empty threats."

Will held out his hand to Matthew for the paper he still clutched. "We don't let this stuff get to us, right?" Will said.  

Matthew looked at the hand Will held out. "I'm not always the best example," Will said, touching the gauze wrapping with his fingertips. "We have to support each other."

 

Will distracted Matthew by having him fix dinner while he put the stack of papers out of sight. Will told Matthew he was really in the mood for some spaghetti. As Matthew boiled the pasta and heated up the sauce, Will popped open a beer for both of them. Soon the kitchen was warm with steam and the smell of marinara sauce and Matthew began to loosen up.

Freddie waved away the beer Will brought for her. He shrugged and took a sip of it himself. They were out of Matthew's earshot. He was humming tunelessly in the kitchen as he worked.

"You were very quiet," Will said. "I don't trust you when you are quiet. It means you are thinking." 

"I guess I'm the only one who's still concerned about getting arrested," Freddie said. "I've had my legal scrapes but it was all white collar. I've never been on the wrong side of the bars."

"I won't say its fun," Will said, "but I don't think you have to worry about this happening tomorrow." Will sat down across from Freddie at the table.  " It too complete. It's got law enforcement's big grimy paws prints all over it. Here's how we'll know: if you don't write anything about these papers, you'll hear from your source soon, asking where the story is. If he was really in it for the money and the thrill you won't hear from him until he needs another adrenaline boost or cash infusion. If it’s a setup he'll be in contact because his goal is getting the story out there to see our reaction to it."

Freddie motioned for the beer and Will slid it to her. She took a sip. "I have my own reasons for thinking this isn't a set up. I didn't just give that source money. He got payment he would have a hard time explaining to his superiors."

"You underestimate how much law enforcement brass will tolerate to get a solid arrest. The ends justify the means," he said.  "I didn't want to say this in front of Matthew, but I would understand if you didn't want to be part of this conspiracy. You have a lot more to lose than we do."

"Are you cutting me loose?"

"I know better than to tell you to do anything," he said. "I just said I wouldn't blame you if you did. Some of what was said in those papers, even if they are fake, was just nasty small-mindedness. Somebody wrote that, which means someone in Justice has no love for you."

"I don't need secret documents to tell me that."

Freddie spun the beer bottle around and picked at the label.

"Are you angry about the letters?" Will asked. "From Hannibal?"

"I'm angry that you didn't trust me enough to let me know what was going on," she said. "I was mentioned by name in that letter. I understand the usefulness of a well-placed lie, but I hate to be left out."

She looked at him searchingly. There were more secrets between them than the letters. This was as good enough a time as any to come clean about something. Anything. Will might have spoken if Matthew hadn't come over and handed them each a plate of spaghetti.

"Chow time," he said.

 

Matthew had a beer, and then two, with dinner. Will only picked at the pasta he had claimed he wanted, and sat at the table while Matthew and Freddie ate. Once the dinner dishes were cleared, Will plunked the whiskey bottle down in the middle of the table as if it was some kind of desert.

"Should I get two glasses or three?" Matthew asked from the kitchen.

"None for me, thanks," Freddie said.

"Three," Will said.

"No thank you," Freddie said, holding up he half-finished original beer. "Are we celebrating or drowning our sorrows?"

"Either works," Will said. "And if you're right and I'm getting arrested tomorrow, I'm not letting some county cop take custody of my whiskey."

Will and Matthew clinked their filled glasses.

"To freedom," Matthew said.

"This is the bachelor party for our freedom," Will said. "If Freddie's right then it’s the old ball and chain for us."

"Don't want to go back to prison," Matthew said, putting his head down on the table on top of his crossed arms. Will ruffled his hair.

Freddie figured since Will and Matthew had done the dishes this morning (if  you could "do" dishes by breaking half of them), and Matthew had cooked, Freddie should clean up. _Don't want the SWAT team to see a sink full of dishes think we're living like pigs_ , she thought. _I can't control everything, but I can control that._

At the table, the conversation dipped and swirled around points Freddie found hard to follow sober.  What she could follow was the body language, Will and Matthew leaning close--shoulder to shoulder, a tap on the hand or forearm to get the other's attention. A comfortable physicality that was usually held in check around her.

"You know what we should do?" Will said to Matthew. "Go fishing. Tomorrow."

"I've never been," Matthew said.

"I know that!"

"If a few hours you are going to throw your gear in the car and go fishing?" Freddie asked. "No, you aren't. You'll be in bed with a hangover, the two of you."

"I've gone fishing hungover before. Its not hard. The air is clean and when you get that first smell of fish guts you just puke everything up. Feel like a new man."

"Fishing is a great idea. Lets do it," Matthew said. "I have to hurry up and go to bed so I can wake up." He got unsteadily, to his feet. Will stood to help, but Freddie had the mental image of them both toppling down the stairs.

"Let me," Freddie said, draping Matthew's arm over her shoulders. She couldn't support his weight, but she could keep him from listing too much to one side. "If you puke, I'm going to dump you on the floor."

"Sounds fair," Matthew said. With his free hand, he pinched one of her curls, pulled it and let it go to watch it spring back.

"I always wanted to do that."

They made their way upstairs slowly, but without falling over.

"You think I'm not good for him," he said when they finally got in the upstairs bedroom, "but you are wrong."

"Okay," Freddie said, and dumped him on the bed.

"I'll take it from here. Thanks," Will said from the doorway.

"Help me with his legs," Freddie said.

Together they heaved Matthew's legs on to the bed. Matthew pulled the pillow close, shoved his face down in it and fell asleep.

"He'll be fine. I'm going to bed," Freddie said, "Its been a long day."

"Go ahead, I'll be there in a minute."

Freddie got nearly to the door and turned around. "Look, if you are going to wait until I'm asleep and come sneaking back in here, why don't you just cut the bullshit and stay."

Will blinked and looked down at the sleeping form.

"Can you be honest with me for once?" Freddie asked. "Might as well make a clean slate of it if you are going to jail tomorrow."

"I can't be honest with you, if I don't even know myself."

"Tell me what you do know. Is Matthew one of the people you love?"

"Yes," he said and put his hand on Matthew's leg.

When it looked like Will wasn't going to elaborate she said "Go on."

 "The day I got his phone call that he was out of jail, I knew. We were bonded together in a way I can't break and as time has gone on, I found I don't want to. Matthew means a lot to me, but I knew you two didn't get along, so I didn't know how to make that mesh."

"You should have just told me," she said, exasperated. "I don't care about monogamy, or exclusivity but I do care about honesty. I told you I don't like being left out."

Freddie stood, considered for a moment and then started getting undressed.

"What are you doing?"

"I told you. I don't like being left out." She squeezed Matthew's bicep and he stirred. "Hey, Matty, wake up. Do you want to get laid before you go to prison?"

While he was asleep, he had obviously missed something, but he wasn't about to ask too many questions. "What? Yeah."

"Okay, Freddie, that's enough," Will said.

"We can't let him go to prison without a proper send-off. If you don't want to take care of him I will. You don't even have to be here."

A challenge crackled between them.

"I guess it depends on what Matthew wants," Will said. "He's an adult."

 

What Matthew wanted was Mr. Graham.

Before Matthew had even laid eyes on him, he knew Mr. Graham was something special. It wasn't the crimes Will was accused of that mattered, it was his ability to understand anyone. Matthew was ready to use his access to the prisoner to get to know everything he could about him. Night shifts would give him long, quiet hours to watch and listen and to chat him up. Then the first time Matthew saw him in the dank basement of BSHCI, it was like there was no one else in room. Mr. Graham drew his eyes even when he didn't want to look. That sly knowingness that Mr. Graham had in his expression, together with his silence and his rare cryptic remarks made Matthew wonder endlessly about what was going on behind the facade. He wanted to be on the other side of that wall, know Mr. Graham's secret self. And unlike idiots like Dr. Chilton, Matthew actually could.

There had been those bars between them, and even when the cameras were disabled, there were eyes watching watching always watching. Matthew could look, but not touch. Except for those moments when he took off the handcuffs for Will and his fingers brushed the tender pink lines across Will's wrists. He had wanted to kiss the wounds his captivity had given him. Matthew could be as cool as ice when he was with Will, but afterward would have to go to the janitor's closet just to catch his breath. If he had a break he let himself fantasize what it would be like to be together on the outside. Matthew crossed a line from fantasizing to planning somewhere along the way. He got a little carried away and his plans didn't always work out. That was all water under the bridge. It was a winding path, but now he was here.

Matthew had called Will when they let him out of jail and Will had come for him. Finding Freddie Lounds was in the house had been an unwelcome surprise, but Matthew thought if he could just call Will his friend, it would be enough.  Will and Freddie couldn't last forever. Matthew had been waiting so long, imagining and fantasizing. For so long Will was untouchable, first kept away by bars and glass and then "free" but hurt and refusing the comfort only he, Matthew, could offer him.

The night after Dr. Bloom's funeral Will told him the plan. They had to go after the Ripper. Will started to tell him the details, Mason Verger was involved somehow, but Matthew didn't care. "Just tell me what you want me to do, and I'll do it," he said. "I love you."

They had their first kiss and Matthew couldn't let him go.

Will had sworn Matthew to secrecy. Freddie couldn't know any of it until the time was right. Will would find a way to explain it to her. Matthew barely heard what he was saying. He didn't care. That night they went as far as they ever had, touching each other in the dark. He almost thought it was a dream. There was no witnesses, no public acknowledging that anything had changed between them.

They started sneaking around behind Freddie's back, a whole relationship made of whispered promises and quick kisses and stolen moments. Will always telling him that he couldn't explain to Freddie because he didn't know where to start. He couldn't explain the feelings he had for both of them without it sounding like lies. Lies sounded like the truth and honesty sounded like bullshit. _I love you both_ , and, in more desperate moments, _I need you both_.

Matthew thought of Freddie, when he thought of her at all, as annoying obstacle in their way.He hadn't pictured her as being part of his fantasies, but she was here, half-undressed and asking him what he wanted.

Matthew didn't have to be asked twice what he wanted. He wanted Mr. Graham, Will, to be his.

Matthew had wanted to kiss Will all night. Having him sit next to him so warmly inviting was agony. He knew Will was trying to get him drunk and he went with it, to forget the possibility of them being arrested. He would be separated from Will not just for this night, but possibly for every night after that.

The only thing worse than feeling the handcuffs on his own wrists was that he would know Will would be getting the same. When the arresting officers twisted Matthew's arms behind his back, he would know Will was getting his arm twisted just as roughly. This time Matthew could not be the one to unlock Will's cuffs and shackles. No one would offer Will something to read or eat or be there to rub the circulation back into his hands when the cuffs came off. Another failure to protect Will was worse than the thought of jail. So Matthew pretended to be happy until he was drunk enough to act happy.

He was thankful for the alcohol now. Being slightly drunk slowed him down enough that when Will pushed him down on the bed and kissed his neck and chest, hand on his cock, he could tolerate it. They had gotten to this point before and in his excitement he couldn't hold back. Being stroked through his clothes had been enough that dark night after the funeral.

When Will took him into his mouth he knew that even with the alcohol in his system he couldn't last. Matthew had wanted this for so long.

Will moaned around his cock as Freddie slid two lubricated fingers into him. Will rocked gently back and forth, on one end sliding up and down Matthew and feeling Freddie slide back and forth into him. There was so much harmony in it, Will felt insubstantial, joined to two others in a way that made himself disappear. _It’s a relief to not have to be me for a while, to not be anyone_ , he would have thought, if his thoughts could have been distilled into words.

Matthew wanted to think about exactly what Will was doing to him, to burn it in his memory. There were so many things he couldn't forget if he wanted to and this was finally something he wanted to keep knife-sharp in his memory. If he never saw Will again, they couldn't take this from him. He tried to hold the feeling, but he wanted the image to go with it. He knew with one look, he would be lost. He made himself open his eyes. The mouth he had stared at, the tongue he has seen darting out between Will's lips, now wrapped around his cock. As good, no, better, than he imagined. Because it was real. Matthew just had time to take in the gauze-wrapped hand on his own hip before he came.

Will had been ready for the taste of it. He'd never been squeamish about catching his taste on the lips of others. What he didn't expect was the heat. It reminded him of nothing more than a mouthful of blood: heat and salt and life. He swallowed, imagining it turning red running down his throat.

"I wanted you to do that to me forever. Fuck," Matthew said, pulling up Will's face to his, kissing him deeply.

While he had been focused on Matthew, he hadn't thought much of his own desire, but now he was painfully aware of every nerve in his body, of Freddie's smooth arms and legs, of Matthew lazily stroking his back and kissing his neck and shoulders. Freddie looked so small and fragile next to Matthew, like her bones were made of something lighter. He could feel Matthew watching from under hooded eyelids as he went down on her. He closed his eyes and felt Matthew's hands in his hair and then running down his body, over his ass, between his legs, stroking him as he moved. He could barely breathe. His heart was pounding. He buried his face in the sheet, using his fingers on Freddie, roughly. She enjoyed it, moved towards him. He didn't know who came first. It was a matter of moments' difference.

Being able to touch Will was almost as good as being touched by him.  Matthew brought him pleasure, a moment of forgetfulness that was precious. He held Will close, pressing against him, and then rubbing his returning erection against Will's ass.

"Please," he said, although he wasn't sure exactly what he wanted. He wanted everything at once. They didn't have an eternity of nights to explore each other. If it wasn't tomorrow, it would be the day after or the next week. There was little chance they would avoid arrest, less hope of executing their plan fully with both of them unscathed, and even less a chance of successfully going on the run. If it wasn't handcuffs, it would be a scalpel to the neck or something more drawn out and tortuous.

"I don't think I have anything left to give," Will said.

"Just touch me," he said.

Will turned so they were facing each other. He kissed him. Matthew's mouth still tasted faintly of whiskey. Matthew unwound the gauze on Will's cut hand and kissed his palm, his eyes closed in rapture. Will was spent, but he recognized the need in Matthew, now that it had been awoken would not so easily be put back to sleep. He pushed his own semi-erection next to Matthew and stroked them both with his uninjured hand. Matthew thrust into his grip, his tongue running over the gash on Will's palm. Will felt the sting of the opening wound.

Freddie kneeled, finding a place in the tangle of legs. Her lack of shame was a blanket that covered all of them. She squeezed lube into one hand and rubbed her hands together in an exaggerated expression of delight and took hold of them both, her hands over Will's.

Matthew thrust harder and came into the space between them, over their joined hands. Will let out the breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding.

Freddie laid back down next to Will, placed her sticky hand on his equally sticky stomach and quickly traced his scar. "Good memories for prison," she said.

Will's head was pounding in a way in hadn't since we was sick. He tried to think of something to say, but sleep overtook him before he could.


	15. Alone Into Dark Places

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Matthew and Will leave for their fishing trip. Freddie gets another letter and confronts one of her biggest fears.

After the two sated men on either side of her fell asleep, Freddie stared at the ceiling, unable to sleep. She felt that deep body tired like she had spent a day at the beach. Tired from dodging waves, her skin lined with sweat and salt and feeling tight over her flesh.

Her mind wasn't ready to quiet down. She sat up and waited to see if anyone stirred, and when they didn't, she grabbed what clothes were closest to her—Will's boxers, Matthew's shirt—slipped them on and left the room as quietly as she could.

In the bathroom, Freddie looked at herself in the mirror. She saw the slight shadows under her eyes, but also the high color in her cheeks. She smiled at herself. She splashed some warm water on her face, plucked a random toothbrush from the holder and brushed her teeth.

Freddie went downstairs, laid down on the bed down there, then patted the space next to her to coax Applesauce up. Will didn't like the dogs to be up on the furniture, but Freddie liked being the cool parent and broke the rules when he wasn't around.

"Can't sleep?"

Freddie sat up. "You move like a cat," she said.

"I can when I want to."

Matthew sat down on the edge of the bed, Applesauce a barrier between them. He was bare chested, and smiling his damned knowing smile. Freddie wondered what his tattoos meant. She hadn't seen them up close before tonight and they didn't make any more sense to her now.

In his understated way, Matthew was as much a chameleon as Will was. He had hidden his physique and ink under scrubs at BSHCI and Freddie had hardly looked his way. No one did. Matthew did what Will couldn't seem to do: get people to overlook him. For good or ill, Will had always attracted interested gazes.

"Did I wake you?" Freddie asked. "I thought you were pretty well knocked out."

"I sleep like a cat too," he said. "Learned how to do it while napping on the job."

She hugged her knees to her chest. "So you wanted to have a word with me, out of Will's earshot. What is it?"

"You get right to the point," Matthew said.

"Something I learned on the job."

"I just wanted to thank you."

Freddie crinkled her nose. "For half a hand job?"

"No. For your blessing," Matthew said. "Will's been conflicted about what he wants and your open-mindedness has put his mind at ease."

"So you think I was telling him—what? That he can have his cake _and_ pie _and_ eat it too?" she said, shaking her head, laughing in a way that sounded false to her ears. "You are reading too much into it."

Matthew turned his head and looked at her in a direct, but not aggressive way. "So why? Did you just find me that irresistible?" The smirk deepened. "It can't be that. You can barely stand talking to me."

"People don't have to like each other to experiment. I wanted to see how far things would go if I started the ball rolling."

He shook his head. "Naw," he said simply. "That's not it." He looked at her expectantly, patiently.

Freddie took a deep breath and dropped her chin to her knees. She imagined Matthew repeating whatever she said to Will. "The letters from Hannibal bothered me. I'm done. I want this to go back to being a story that I report on, but that I'm not part of. I know my limits.I'm tough, but I'm regular-person tough. I'm not like the two of you. I can handle being out on the world full of muggers and sex perverts, but this is something else."

She thought of holding Randall's frozen jaw in her hand, detached from the rest of his body and wrapped in plastic but still looking so human. No mistaking it for anything else. Freddie took another breath. "I used to think that people like you and Will lacked something. Not empathy, obviously, but humanity or compassion. But I think you have some extra quality. I never believed Frederick Chilton was the Ripper because he didn't have It, whatever It is. Will and Hannibal have it, so do you. This darkness, whatever you want to call it."

Matthew nodded his agreement. "So where does that leave us?"

"What you call a blessing, I call passing the torch. Will Graham is your problem now," her smile faltered, and she ran her hands through Applesauce's fur. "You can deal with him better than I can."

This was not her problem anymore. There was nothing she could do about it. She had tried explaining Will and she tried helping him. She couldn't do either. She was at the end of what she was willing to do and was more than happy to pass him along to someone else. If Matthew thought he was the companion that Freddie couldn't be, he was welcome to the job.

 "Do you have somewhere else to go?" Matthew said, kindly. 

"I have options," she said crisply.

Matthew put his hand over hers. "Think about that tomorrow. Come back to bed with us," he said. "Just until morning. Give him that. Will thinks he has actually pulled it off. He's been a wreck about it."

"I'm not going to feel bad for him," she said.

"Not asking you to," Matthew said. "Just asking a favor. To keep the peace until sunrise."

 

Sunrise came and went before the three started to wake. Matthew woke in the best mood of his life and lay in bed enjoying it. Will felt like he had been beaten with a whiffle bat. He sat up and dry-swallowed a few aspirin. Matthew cheerfully said he would make the coffee and Will didn't object, although his coffee was always terrible.

"Are we still fishing?" Matthew asked.

"If you're still interested, sure," Will said.

"Oh, I'm interested," he said.

"How are you doing this morning?" Freddie asked Will once Matthew left to start the coffee.

"I think youth and exuberance triumphs over age and experience," he said. "I am too old for drunken orgies." He looked at the crusted-over wound in his hand. "How are you doing?"

Freddie hadn't had the best night's sleep. The bed and blankets were not big enough for all of them and she had enough on her mind to keep her tossing and turning.

"Just fine," she said.

 

Will's injured hand didn't look at bad as he thought it would. He rewrapped it after his shower. Being clean and having a cup of coffee didn't make him feel perky, exactly, but good enough to drag his carcass through another day.

They didn't get the bright and early start he had envisioned, but by noon he and Matthew were packing the car for their trip.

 They would put a few miles behind them before stopping for the night. Freddie stayed out of the way, in her room but with the door open to show she wasn't being unfriendly. She even walked out on the porch to see them off.

"We're leaving in a minute," Will said. He heaved a stuffed backpack into the trunk and walked back to the porch. "If you decide to go anywhere, Margot said she'll take the dogs. Just call her up, it's all set. We might be gone for a while. I don't want to tie you down with my obligations."

"You set up long-term care for your dogs? Are you even intending to come back?"

"I'm not taking my intentions as accomplished fact," Will said. "What I intend to do and what gets done might be two very different things. They have been in the past."

Freddie rolled her eyes at he complicated answer.

"I _intend_ to return in a few days," he said.

"So where do you think I'm going that I can't watch the dogs for a few days?" she asked.

"I don't know, but you aren't going to be here when I get back," Will said. "I do know a kiss off when I'm one-third of it."

Freddie didn't bother denying it, but she didn't really want to discuss it either. She wanted Matthew and Will to drive off into the sunset and out of her life.

"Am I wrong?" Will asked. 

"You don't seem too broken up about it," she said.

"Do you want me to be upset? Are we being that cliché, Freddie?" he made a wiping motion with his hand and then walked up until he was close enough to take both her hands in his. "No. That wasn't fair. I would like you to stay. I would like the situation to be different so that you could stay, but circumstances being what they are, I understand why you wouldn't want to." He gave her hands a last squeeze and dropped them. "And I'm not talking about Matthew."

Freddie's phone buzzed in her pocket, but she ignored it. Will kissed her goodbye. It was a quick goodbye kiss appropriate for a few days' separation, not a goodbye forever kiss. Freddie and Matthew shook hands. Fitting, thought Freddie, since they had just struck a deal.

"Stay safe, okay," Matthew said.

"You too," Freddie said.

"I'll keep both of us safe," he said.

As they drove off, Freddie wondered if the other part of the "us" was Will or herself. She had no doubt that Matthew would fight with everything he had to save Will. But Matthew was also taking something dangerous away from Freddie, keeping her from harm. In his mind, he was keeping her safe, too.

 Freddie waited until the car pulled completely out of sight before she checked her phone.

_< Hey gurl where's the story? Im getting nervous :/ >_

It was her source. Damon L. Perry. _Dammit,_ she thought. Will said if he was a cop he would be contacting her soon. It had barely been 24 hours since their meeting. 

_Don't worry,_ she texted back.

Her phone rang.

"Hey," Perry said in a hushed voice. "I'm at work. The suspense is just killing me, Red. When do you think that story will go up? I want to be ready for all the backlash and witch hunts because they are going to be coming. Heh heh. "

"You shouldn't call me from work," Freddie said.

"Its okay," he said vaguely.

"There were things in that file about me," she said. "I have to figure out how I wanted to handle that. Talk to my lawyers."

"I didn't think you were going to publish that, obviously," Perry said. "I put that in as a favor to you. A bonus, so you can be prepared."

"Well, thanks," she said without any hint of gratitude in her voice. "I'm still in a little shock, thinking I might go to jail."

The hushed tone was gone. "It can't be a surprise to you that you are being looked at. You're in it, Freddie, up to your ears."

 Will had been right. It was a set-up. Perry was a cop or working with the cops.

Maybe Perry realized he went too far. He backtracked, almost wining. "I could get fired over this," he said.

"Then you should be happy there is no story. You got payment for nothing and you are still safe in your job. Win-win for you."

"So you're not going to publish any of that? I gave you that information because the public doesn't know how dangerous these people are. While my bosses sit on their asses and do nothing, people could be getting killed. What kind of journalist are you anyway?" He paused to let her respond indignantly. She didn't.  "Is your personal relationship with Will Graham more important that the safety of the public?"

"I don't have a personal relationship with Will Graham," she said sweetly. "Just because a guy, as you wrote so eloquently 'shuts a bitch up by shoving his dick down her throat' that doesn't mean she's his girlfriend, right, Damon? Isn't that your point of view on bitches?"

"If I find out you helped Will Graham or anyone else evade arrest, I will make sure you rot in jail," he said angrily.

"Do not threaten me again or I will ruin your career. I don't care if you are who you claim to be or not, I will not hesitate to play dirty.  I will tell your boss you demanded a sexual favor as payment."

"You don't have any proof," he said but he didn't sound sure.

"I have an audio recording. But it really doesn't matter. The allegation alone would be enough to taint you forever. They won't fire you. You'll just find everyone else is getting promoted while you stagnate. Good luck if you have a female boss somewhere  along the way. Be sure you tell her the best way to shut up bitches. Don't call me again, Damon."

She hung up on him. She didn't really have any audio recording of their meeting, but if Perry was working for the police they had been taping that conversation and Perry would have his hands full explaining what Freddie had been talking about. Now it was Damon L. Perry's behavior that would be the topic of conversation.

 

Freddie walked the property, telling herself she was burning off her anger at Damon Perry, but she was really indulging in a good look around, knowing she might never be back. Once she was done with something, she was done. She wanted to put miles between herself and Wolf Trap, between herself and whatever dark thing flowed around and through Will Graham, between him and Matthew.

Her eyes landed on the shed. _Dark thing._ She hadn't been inside the shed since the day she had been attacked. The attack hadn't been real, but that retrospective knowledge hadn't removed the fear from her memory. That had been imprinted on her in a way that was untouched by logic. Her mind told her there was nothing to fear, but her heart hammered in her chest. Freddie walked up towards the shed, but at the last moment veered off to walk down the drive instead.

Being scared of the shed was stupid and Freddie despised herself for it. If she let it beat her, how could she go back into other dark spaces? She had to know that if she ever got a tip to go to the observatory, for example, she would go without hesitation. She couldn't afford to be afraid of the dark. That's where people keep their secrets.

At the end of the drive, Freddie opened the mailbox, took out the regular bills and fliers, and the one squarish envelope that had her name on it. She shoved the other papers back in the box and held the envelope.  It was addressed to "Ms. Fredericka Lounds c/o Will Graham" in that unmistakable handwriting.

Freddie held the envelope by the corner and slapped against her palm a few times, thinking. Envelope in hand, she marched up to the shed. She was going to read the letter the way Will read these letters, alone in the gloom of the shed. If she could do this, carry the bogeyman in with her and listen to him whisper in her ear, than she could do anything.

Freddie pushed the door open and went inside the shed.

It was very nearly empty. The police and FBI had carted off almost everything that could have been evidence. The freezer and all its contents were gone. Freddie had been picturing it as it was that day she was attacked, but now it was spare and even more abandoned looking than it had been then. Some of the horror had gone out with the chains and plastic sheeting that had been carted off.  Randall's bone suit was gone, but so was the pulley system it had been suspended from. Above her head, Freddie could see a square of wood was missing from the old beam. Whoever removed all the chains and hardware hadn't even unscrewed it. They cut it from the beam, mountings and all.

There was a small dorm fridge and a folding chair near the center of the room. The fridge was full of beer and had a single glass in the door. A milk crate on the other side of the chair held harder alcohol, mostly whiskey but also a few bottles of cheap vodka. There wasn't anything else out there. No television, nothing to read or look at.  It reminded Freddie of a jail cell. A jail cell with booze. Frederick told her that Will used to just sit in his cell at BSHCI, staring at the bare wall for hours at a time, gone somewhere in his head.

Freddie sat down in the chair and the green plastic webbing creaked. From this seat, she could see what Will had been seeing. Nothing. A wall of weathered planks, voids in the dust of the floor where items had been removed, empty holes where nails and screws had been taken out. Absence and lack.

Once Matthew had taken Hannibal's letters away, Will had still come out here. He said it was to drink, but that hadn't been the main activity. That was the excuse. Will got something else out of being alone and staring at the wall.

 Freddie stared at the same wall and tried to put herself in Will's frame of mind. 

Drunk or sober, he had sat here. Even without the physical letters, the words would still be with him. While he sat here alone, a few steps away, inside his house there were people who cared for him. Will had taken in his jailer and his biggest critic, and he was getting them to fall in love with him. They were creating a space that, against all probability, was warm and full and, at times, happy.

He needed this drafty barn to remind him of hollow emptiness, and the dark thing that seeped into the empty places. So he carved out a private place to be alone with it. Other than Hannibal's house, this was the place Will had acted the worst. He had done his darkest deeds here. He had killed Randall in his home. That was self-defense, maybe. But he had done the butchery out here, and that was just savagery.

Without this space Will risked forgetting he had been both the gutter and the gutted and he didn't want to forget. He needed a place where, with Hannibal's words ringing in his ears and unfurling behind his eyes, he could pick at his stitches until they bled. Freddie came as close to understanding Will as she ever had, the push and pull he felt toward all humanity, the anger that comes with constantly being frustrated, unsatisfied, powerful and powerless.

Freddie was ready to tug at her own unraveled ends. She opened the envelope.

 

 

> Dear Ms. Lounds,
> 
> Have you received my other messages? I hope this gets to you directly, without the usual interference. 
> 
> I shall keep this message short and businesslike, for it is business I need to discuss with you. I read your coverage of Alana Bloom's funeral. Outstanding  and commendable journalism as usual.  It was a shame that I could not be there personally, but circumstances being what they are, it was not possible at the time.
> 
> However, there was one mistake in your coverage. I want to correct you, gently but insistently, on one detail. I did not kill Alana Bloom. I deny all responsibility for her fatal fall. I also deny killing my former patient Randall Tier and the unfortunate bailiff Andrew Sykes. As for anyone else, make of their omission what you will.
> 
> To make certain there is no bad blood between us, I will offer you a secret, an exclusive, something I never told even Will. I leave it to you to decide if it news fit to print.
> 
> You see, I knew you were alive all along.
> 
> Did you think you could spend an afternoon frolicking with Will and then send him straight to me and have me not know?  He smelled of you. I know the scent of your soap, your perfume, your skin. Your scent profile is as individual as a fingerprint or a spiral of your incarnadine hair. There was not a hint of singe or ash, just a body very much alive-- breathing, eating and rutting. It was an affront to the gift given to both you and Will. In death, you were transformed to the divine. A gift to you that was rejected. A gift to Will you stole from him. The gift was robbed of meaning, a senseless mangling of a stranger who did not deserve the transformation.
> 
> If you were alive, that meant there was secrets and deception between Will and I, a festering wound in our relationship. An abscess must be lanced to draw out the infection and cleanse the wound, lest it rots and takes healthy tissue with it.
> 
> Assigning blame is such a tricky thing. There is enough here for all to share a piece. I have my part, and, now you know, so do you.
> 
> Hannibal Lecter

 

 

 Freddie had always pictured Hannibal murderous side as a scalpel: subtle, easily hidden,but very very sharp. That's how he would kill her, she thought, with a well-place slice that she would not see coming and would barely feel.  His anger at her was not small and sharp. His contempt and rage was a heavy black rock, blunt on one side, jagged enough to shred flesh on the other. Hannibal would gladly lift this rock over his head and bring it down on her over and over again. At one time, maybe he would have given her the mercy of a quick death. That time had passed.

Freddie let the wave of panic build and finally crest and wash over her. The letter shook in her hand. She considered taking a belt of Will's vodka but decided against it. She didn't want any crutch. Nothing would see her through but her own strength.

She didn't know how long it took, but eventually she stopped shaking and her heart started to slow to normal. She looked at the letter again. The words swam in front of her eyes, but she forced herself to see past the penmanship and finely-wrought anger down to the cold hard facts.

If Hannibal knew the FBI was tricking him about Freddie being alive, then what happened at the house wasn't an explosion of sudden rage. It had been planned. Jack, Will and Alana walked into not just a dangerous situation, but an outright trap. He wanted Freddie to feel guilty. She didn't. She felt sorry that things had happened the way they did, but the only person who should feel guilt was Hannibal, the person who did those things. 

Hannibal was reminding her that he killed some people, but not everyone. Not Randall Tier, not Sykes and not, he claimed, Alana Bloom.

 But who killed Alana, if Hannibal didn't? _He lies,_ she thought. _That's what he does._ But this didn't seem like the right kind of lie. He wasn't claiming innocence. He was proud of what he had done and gotten away with. Freddie's gut told her Hannibal was telling the truth.

_Who else was in the house? Jack, Abigail, Will?_

She didn't like any of the other possibilities. She didn't like being steered toward some awful truth and she didn't like who was steering her.

 

The dogs were waiting inside. They followed Freddie around the house, worriedly pacing between her and the empty rooms. They were looking for Will and Matthew and, not finding them, checked back with Freddie. She didn't know if they were asking her for help finding their masters or if they just needed reassurance that she hadn't gone too and left them totally alone. She gave them a little attention and each of them a treat, although Will would disapprove. Treats are earned, he told her. He might never be back to give them a treat. She gave them all a second one.

There was a little disorder that followed Matthew and Will's flurry of hasty packing--mugs and breakfast dishes in the sink, rejected fishing gear scattered on the desk. Freddie handled one of the lures carefully, wary of the barbed hook. Although she didn't have the time or patience for most hobbies, she could see how making these could be soothing. They were pretty and useful. She put it back down and noticed the amount of gear that was there.  It seemed like a lot. Freddie wished she knew more about fishing so she could make more sense of what was taken and what was left behind. 

_So_ , she asked herself, _fishing gear aside, what else did they take and what did they leave?_

Freddie knew this house pretty well, it's hiding places and cubbyholes. She had made casual nosiness a habit. Open a drawer here, look behind the books on the shelf over there. She had a good mental inventory of the house's valuables. Now Freddie went through the rooms as thoroughly as a police officer.  Not as thoroughly as a Q-tip wielding CSI but maybe at the level of an alert and suspicious beat cop, pulling out every drawer and running her hands on the underside of furniture.

It wasn't what she found, but what she didn't find that was telling. All of Will's medication and first aid supplies were gone from the medicine cabinet.  She didn't know what medication Matthew was on, but there were no telltale orange bottles left behind in his room either. Some clothes were missing from Will's closet. Freddie remembered the shirt because she had seen it while looking for something for Will to wear to Alana's funeral. Freddie had thought the shade of blue would have looked so nice with Will's eyes, but it wasn't appropriate for a funeral, so she put it back. That shirt, the charcoal dress pants and the tie that would have brought the outfit together were all gone.

She kept looking. Every firearm including the one usually strapped under the desk was gone. Missing from the fireproof safe in the upstairs closet was a thick envelope of cash, and both Will and Matthew's passports.

_Fishing trip my ass_ , Freddie thought.

She brought out her phone and thought about calling Will, but stopped. He had had the opportunity to tell her the truth this morning and didn't. A conversation now wouldn't be any different. Instead Freddie dialed the number Will gave her for Margot Verger. A man answered the phone.

"Ms. Lounds! Ms. Verger was expecting your call. She isn't taking any phone calls right now, but she told me to tell you we can send a van for the dogs tomorrow morning. Will that be soon enough?"

"That's great," Freddie said. "Thank you so much."

If Margot wouldn't come to the phone for Freddie, Freddie would have to go to her instead.

 


	16. The House of Verger

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will told Freddie to stay away from the Vergers. But now Will's not around and Freddie wants to find out where all that money is coming from and why.
> 
> "To be blunt, you and my sister have the same questionable choice in men, don't you?" Mason said when he could finally talk again, his voice sounding slightly choked. "I'm not saying I don't see the appeal of Will Graham. He's easy enough on the eyes, but he comes with so much baggage."

That night Freddie was calmer than she had any right to be. The three most dangerous people she had ever met (who were also still alive) were unaccounted for.  Hannibal Lecter took a plane to Europe, they said, and wouldn't risk coming back. How anyone could claim to predict what he would do after seeing what he had done already? This boggled Freddie's mind. It might feel safer to make these predictions, but it was a false sense of security.

For actual security, that night Freddie slept behind a locked door, her gun at the ready and Applesauce beside her. She hadn't had a dog since childhood and she had grown fond of Applesauce in particular, although she tried not to let Will see her favoritism. Freddie's usual wandering lifestyle was not compatible with pet ownership. Now it looked like Will's wasn't either.

Freddie wondered if Applesauce understood being handed from owner to owner. Would she miss Will? Did she already miss Alana? Did she miss the owner who dropped her off at the pound or on the side of the road and didn't look back? Would she wonder where Freddie went when she left her at Muskrat Farm?

 

The van arrived punctually at ten AM the next day.  It was white with the words "Verger Meatpacking" on the side of it. Freddie answered the door to a short fireplug of a man in a painter's cap and maroon coveralls. She had kept the dogs inside all morning, both to keep her company and to make sure she didn't misplace one. As soon as the door was opened wide a crack the dogs nosed it open and burst into the yard, tails wagging in delight.

The man, named Don if the embroidered tag on his coveralls was to be believed, looked down at the clipboard he held.

"I'm picking up some dogs," he said, utterly bored. He didn't even glance at the pack that had just run past him.

Freddie took the pen and clipboard she was handed but didn't sign. She hugged the clipboard to her chest and tried to look sweet and concerned.           

"They aren't going to the meatpacking plant, are they?" she asked.

"Course not," Don said. "We don't have the permits for processing dog meat. Not in this country. I'm taking them to some nice new kennels at Muskrat Farm. They won't even be at the same location as the processing plant."

"I'll help you round them up," she said. "But I want to follow you. I want to personally hand their care off to Ms. Verger."

His shrug said _Suit yourself_. Freddie signed the paper on the line and handed clipboard and pen back to Don.

Amazingly, the dogs listened to Freddie as she corralled them into the van. The treats in her pocket didn't hurt.

"Let me just lock up and I'll follow you over," she said to Don, who just heaved himself up into the van and slammed the door.

Freddie locked the door, twisted the key off the ring and slipped in under the door.  She held the letter from Hannibal, debating if she should slip that under the door too.

Don beeped the horn and stuck his head out the window. The beeping horn set the dogs to barking so he yelled to be heard over them.

"Hey, lady, I gotta get outta here. You coming with or not?"

Freddie jammed the letter down in her bag and hurried to her car.

_Just like rich people,_ Freddie thought, _to call a castle a farm._ Muskrat "farm, " with its turrets and stone walls, had more in common with a small fortified village. Freddie followed the van through the gates. At a fork in the drive, Don put his arm out of the window and pointed down the left-hand fork to show her this is where their paths diverged.

Freddie followed the drive up to the main house. It looked as welcoming as a crypt. She thought longingly of the motel room with the cardboard walls that was waiting for her somewhere down the road. She couldn't imagine feeling comfortable in there. With only two people living here, it was possible they had whole wings that no one ever set foot in.

Freddie parked in the gravel drive in front of what she assumed was the main house.  The speed at which the uniformed servant answered the door reassured Freddie she was in the right place.

"I'm Freddie Lounds, here to see Margot Verger," she said, walking past him into the hall. He took her coat, but she insisted on keeping her bag.

He showed Freddie to a sitting room.  "I'll see if Ms. Verger is in," he said. The polite way, Freddie supposed, of saying he would check to see if Margot would talk to her. 

Left alone, Freddie prowled the room. It was decorated to the point of being overstuffed, but it was soulless. It was a holding place that no one really lived in. There was a long row of outdated law books. Useless as information, they formed a solid dusty block on the shelf at eye level. The portraits of unpopular family members and old dusty books with gold-edged bindings wound up here among the velvet drapes and uncomfortable but undoubtedly valuable furniture.

The servant came back while Freddie was inspecting the book titles. "Ms. Verger will be ready to receive you momentarily, but she wondered if you would be so good as to visit with her brother, Mr. Verger, in the interim."

"It would be my pleasure," Freddie said.

 

The Vergers has been careful to mask as much of the paraphernalia of illness and disease as possible. Freddie could hear the hissing of a breathing machine, but the blue tubing disappeared into the back of a cabinet, as did all the clear IV tubing and white monitor wires. The bed Mason was propped up in was an adjustable hospital bed, but was covered with a rich red brocade blanket. All that was visible of Mason were the hands folded on the coverlet and a wisp of blonde hair cresting over the face mask and eye shade that obscured whatever was left of his mangled face.

"Come closer," he said in a high, but surprisingly clear voice. "I can't turn my head to see you."

Freddie walked past a round, low fish tank where a large eel swam and sat in the chair that was positioned at the foot of the bed.

"I just wanted to get a look at you," he said. Freddie could see his blue eyes watching her steadily from behind the shade." I can't go out to meet my guests, so I _insist_ they are brought in to me. Margot is so flexible when it comes to accommodating my _eccentricities_. I'm a huge fan of your blog. It is a _delight_ to meet you in person. Just a real treat."

It was odd that his voice was so animated, as if compensating for his hands that remained completely still, unable to move.

"The pleasure is mine," Freddie said, leaning back and crossing her legs. "I tried to contact you for an interview when you came home from the hospital."

"Sorry to say, your messages never got through to me. That's Margot's doing," Mason said. "She's fiercely protective of me. Like a bulldog."

"We can do an interview right now if you are up for it," she said, reaching into her bag for her digital recorder.

"Oh, Freddie---may I call you Freddie?"

"Certainly," she said.

"Freddie, I do hate to disappoint you, but I won't be a very good interview subject. I am a simple agricultural entrepreneur, and that excites _me_ , but that doesn't _sell_ does it? Animal husbandry. Building the pig of tomorrow today. That isn't _sexy_. "

"About the pig of tomorrow…" Freddie said slowly, carefully. "There have been some bumps along the way in your breeding program. Some dramatic setbacks that have affected you personally."

"Oh, my accident, you mean! My little _tumble_ into the pit." He sounded entirely too cheerful about it and Freddie wondered what kind of drugs were flowing through the clear plastic tubing. "Mercifully, I don't remember my accident. One moment I was above the pen, surveying my work, and the next I'm in the hospital."

The amnesia story was plausible and, Freddie was sure, a total fabrication.

"You can tell me about Margot's accident, then," Freddie said. "Or your experiences as Dr. Lecter's patient. That must have been memorable."

"It was a horrible time for our family. Horrible. Not something I want to rehash. We're very private people, my sister and I," he said. "We've always been very family oriented, the Vergers. Not just in the business, but in everything. In life."

"What about something more long form? A book instead of a blog post," Freddie asked. "A memoir about your early life."

"Until recently, my life was so _uneventful_ ," he said. "Pastoral peace and quiet down on the farm."

That wasn't true. Most of what Freddie had heard was all rumors and speculation, but if just a portion of what she heard about Mason was true,' uneventful' was not an accurate description of his early years.

 "Let's talk about that later," Mason said suddenly. "For now, let's visit. Pleasure before business. I've never been good at self-control, even when I was a little boy. I always ate my desert first. Let's get to know each other, Freddie. I miss people, the whole social scene. The _hoi polloi_ , as it were. I am, at heart, a people person."

Freddie pursed her lips slightly. She was part of the common folk he missed rubbing elbows with. What an ass.

"I want to know about Freddie Lounds," Mason said. "I know you by reputation, of course, but reputations are funny things. I'm not sure I put much stock in them, myself…Do you like pork? Because, I like to make a gift of a freshly slaughtered hog to my special guests, and you…you are special."

"No slaughter on my account, please," Freddie said. "I'm vegetarian."

"That's _disappointing_ ," Mason said. "I don't understand people who don't eat meat. No offense meant to present company, but we're on the top of the food chain for a reason, Freddie. It’s the natural order of things. Cooked meat is what allowed human beings to rise to the top of the simian pile."

"I manage to climb to the top of any pile I'm thrown in without killing animals," she said. "But maybe I'm just made a little stronger than most meat eaters."

"I like your _spunk_ ," Mason said after a moment. "You remind me so much of my sister. So much fight in you. So spirited. You and my sister will get along like a house on fire, I can just tell."  Freddie could hear the smile in his voice. "You have so much _in common_."

"Not so much," Freddie said, brushing a strand of hair from her face. "I'm an itinerant journalist who can fit all my belongings in a medium-sized suitcase and she's an heiress living in a castle." She knew what he was playing at, but wanted him to have to say it. It wasn't _what_ they had in common, but _who_. "What do we have in common, besides _spunk_?"

This prompted a phlegmy laugh from Mason which turned into a coughing jag. A nurse Freddie hadn't seen came out from behind a screen and suctioned something behind the mask.

"To be blunt, you and my sister have the same questionable choice in _men_ , don't you?" Mason said when he could finally talk again, his voice sounding slightly choked. "I'm not saying I don't see the appeal of Will Graham. He's easy enough on the eyes, but he comes with so much _baggage_."

"I don't know anything about your sister's preference in partners and you don't know anything about mine."

"That isn't _strictly_ true on either count," he said. "Word gets around our little social circle, doesn't it? Will is a regular visitor here. He has told me all about you. I just hope your relationship with Will ends better than my sister's." He looked over at her, eyes wide in faux shock. " I…I didn't let the cat out of the bag, did I? You do know about…the failed _insemination_ attempt."

Freddie held up the recorder in her hand. "Is this on record?"

"By all means," Mason said. His relentless cheerful tone was starting to give Freddie a headache. "Let's throw open the closets, and shake those skeletons until they dance. In fact, I have a Will Graham related story for you. My sister, with my blessing, is using Verger meatpacking money to pay for your boyfriend's lawyers and some other yet-to-be-revealed expenses."

Freddie shrugged.

"Don't you want to know why?" Mason said.

"Whatever charms he used to convince your sister—and you—to pay his bills is none of my business," Freddie said. "If Will can stay on friendly terms with his exes, then good for him."

"Margot isn't one of his _exes_ ," Mason said. "It was not much of a _relationship._ I would call it a fling, a mere _flirtation_ with the seamy side of life. In a word, slumming, Freddie, _slumming_. We all make mistakes and have to live with the consequences. I just hate that my sister had endure it. It was sullying to both my sister and the family name."

"And yet, you allow your sister to give Will Graham money and pay for his lawyers," Freddie said. "After what he did to the family. Your sister must have you wrapped around her little finger."

"Margot does not run this estate! I run this estate! Verger Meatpacking is still mine. All of it is mine and I make the decisions. That includes the financial assistance to Will Graham." Mason took a moment to compose himself. His heart rate must have jumped because the nurse came out again. Mason warned her away with a glance. "In the past few months I have learned to love Will, really truly. And if he and Margot are _friends_ , and only friends, well, I couldn't be happier."

He could see Freddie's skeptical look from across the room.

"We had our issues to work through, I'll admit," Mason said, looking up as if petitioning heaven for strength. "We hashed it out man to man, no intermediary necessary. Things went much smoother now that meddling influences have been removed from the picture. I won't say it was easy. We had to get past the past, so to speak.  I had to forgive the way Will Graham _inserted_ himself into our family, and he forgave me for my _less than welcoming_ attitude. He's wonderful as a family friend, but I wouldn't want him as a family member. He has no breeding at all, no pedigree. Beyond marginally good bone structure what could Will Graham possibly offer the Verger bloodline? It was lunacy!"

There was a soft tap on the door.

"Come in," Mason said, not loudly enough to be heard through the heavy oak door, but a nurse took the cue to open it for the visitor.  Freddie was expecting the same servant who showed her into the room, but it was Margot herself. She looked like she was wearing riding gear in her red jacket and high boots. She stepped into the room and stopped at a point that was just in Mason's line of vision.

"Mason, dear," she said. "Are you done with our visitor?"

"I could talk to her for hours, but I would not monopolize her time. Go. Go on," He managed to direct his voice without turning his head. "On one condition. Freddie, you must promise me you'll visit me again. I _promise_ we won't talk about Will Graham next time. We will find other topics of conversation that are just as stimulating."

Freddie slipped one of her cards under the small vase of blue hydrangeas on his nightstand.

"Call me if you change your mind about writing that memoir," she said Freddie made she was back in Mason's  line of sight before she gave him her 100-watt smile.

 

"I thought I should show you where the dogs are going to stay," Margot said to Freddie as they walked into the hall and then out the front door. "Since you were concerned enough to drive out here for a personal visit."

It had been raining lately and the ground was spongy and it squelched under their feet. Margot brought Freddie out to a converted barn that had been made into a kennel just recently, judging by the lingering sawdust and the smell of sawdust and paint.

Once they were inside, Margot turned to Freddie.

"You were talking to my brother about Will," Margot said.

"Your brother was talking to me about Will," Freddie said. "I listened."

"What did he say?"

"He wanted to make sure I knew about you and Will," she said. "I disappointed him by not throwing a fit over it. I guess your brother doesn't have much to entertain himself."

"Mason gets into more than you would expect," Margot said. "Why did you come here now? You weren't really worried about the dogs ending up at the slaughterhouse."

"I stayed away because Will asked me to," Freddie said. "I'm here now because I want some answers and Will is gone. He told me he was going on a fishing trip."

"And you don't believe him."

"Will had a stack of cash that you gave him. That cash is gone now. Why would he need a stack of money—Verger money—to go fishing? What, exactly, is he fishing for? "

Margot stayed silent.

 "What is the connection?" Freddie asked "In what world do the Vergers have anything to do with a disgraced former FBI special agent?  Your brother calls him a beloved family friend while at the same time not seeming to like him very much."

"We are the Hannibal Lecter support group," Margot said with a shrug.

"That's all it is? You hand Will stacks of cash out of kindness and memories of the good old days?"

"I can't explain to outsiders what it does to you when you let Dr. Lecter in your head. He's like a cancer that keeps reappearing.  You cut it out, think it's gone, and then it pops up somewhere else. Talking with Will is my therapy now," Margot said. "I can't go back into a therapist's office. Even if I could trust them to want to help me, I don't think they would understand."

Talking to Margot, listening to the slow cadence of her speech was like getting being pulled down by quicksand. Will had called her clever and a good planner, but she seemed to have no spark to her. Freddie had seen this kind of flatness before in people—victims who had endured repeated terrible trauma. It was a translucent thin-as-ice shell that covered a lot of anger and hurt.  

"All you do is talk about Dr. Lecter?"

"Among other things."

Freddie wracked her brains to think of what other things they could be talking about, but she didn't have any other link between them.  She didn't even know what questions to ask. She finally thought of one piece of the puzzle that stuck out.

"Where does Matthew Brown fit in?" Freddie asked

"Did Matthew go fishing with Will?"

Something about the way Margot said "Matthew," the way it was familiar on her lips, didn't sit well with Freddie.

"Does that make a difference?" Freddie asked.

"No," Margot said after a thoughtful pause. "It's just interesting."

Freddie put her hands together and gripped them tightly to keep her composure and not show her frustration. Margot was evasive and slippery in her answers. Freddie's questions just slid off of her.

Freddie leaned against one of the converted stalls and gazed out through the door pensively. An outright demand for information didn't work, but maybe she could play the sisterhood angle. 

 "Am I ever going to see Will again?" Freddie said and surprised herself with the genuine emotion in her voice.

"I think so," Margot said.

"Before his murder trial?"

"I doubt there will even be a trial."

"Really? Because if I was Kade Prurnell, he and Matthew would have been back in jail a long time ago."

"But they aren't and there's reasons for that," Margot said.  "My lawyers, mostly. They are very, very good. We can protect you, too. Say the word and you get a whole fleet of lawyers."

"Wouldn't that be a conflict of interests?"

Margot waved her hand dismissively. "There are loopholes in every rule."

Freddie raised her chin.

"Cash," she said. "I want cash, too."

Margot nodded. "How much?"

"Unbelievable," Freddie said. "You would do it. If I asked you for a hundred thousand dollars right now as a down payment to not ask questions, you would give it to me. You would cut me a check today."

"If a friend of Will's needed some money, I would give it to them," Margot said. "You make generosity sound like a bad thing."

"This isn't charity, it's bribery," Freddie said. "You and your brother think you can do anything because of your wealth."

"And Will?" Margot asked. "Why does he think he can do whatever he wants?" The dreamy haze in her eyes lifted and Freddie saw their underlying brightness.  The clever woman Will knew was under there somewhere. Blunted by sedatives, perhaps, but she was under there.

"I think he just doesn't care anymore," Freddie said. "He doesn't have anything to lose."

Margot smiled faintly and motioned for Freddie to follow her back out into the yard.

"I'll tell you what I can," Margot said as they walked. "Will is my friend. Mason finds Will useful. Will finds Mason useful."

Freddie wanted to ask how, but held back, barely. She didn't want to interrupt, now that Margot was talking.

"Have you heard the saying 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend?'" Margot asked.

Freddie nodded, silently.

"That describes Mason and Will's relationship perfectly."

So they both hated Hannibal. Freddie tried to think why Mason would hate Hannibal so much. Mason had gotten out of Hannibal's therapy relatively unscathed. Well, except for the accidental fall, and Hannibal couldn't be blamed for that…

Freddie touched Margot on the arm lightly to get her attention. She made her voice low and soothing when she spoke.

"What happened to your brother?" Freddie asked. "Did he really just fall into the pig pen or...did someone give him a little helping hand over the side?"

Margot shook her head. "It wasn't an accident."

"Who did it then?" Freddie asked. "Who hurt Mason?"

Margot hesitated. Freddie felt that wonderful top-of-the-roller coaster feeling that preceded a big revelation. Freddie never got tired of that giddy feeling.

"He did it to himself," Margot said, with a slight smile. "My only regret is that I wasn't there to see it happen."

It was a shocking thing to hear. Not that Mason had mutilated himself--Freddie didn't believe that for a moment--but that his own sister would speak of his pain so fondly. 

"Did he throw himself to the pigs? Was it a suicide attempt?" Freddie asked.

"Mason likes himself too much to deprive the world of his presence," Margot said.

So it really was an accident. Karma. Mason had brought this accident on himself, and his sister believed he deserved it.

Freddie had heard rumors of what Mason was like. What if they were all true, and then some. Margot had to have some reason to go to therapy in the first place. Maybe the hurt Freddie sensed in Margot wasn't all Hannibal's doing. Freddie thought about the immobile man installed in that bed up in his castle, lonely and frustrated.  What had he been like healthy and mobile?

Mason's over-the-top family values had rung false to her. This was the real undercurrent between the Verger siblings and it was as twisted as one of those old bloodthirsty fairy tales.   _Once upon a time a brother and sister lived in alone in castle_ …skip to the end where the brother gets his face eaten off by pigs. 

And of course Will would get mixed up with a family straight out of an Edgar Allen Poe story.  Of course.

 

Margot's servant was waiting for them when they came back from the kennels. Margot nodded to him and he went inside briefly, reappearing with Freddie's coat in hand. It was time for her to go.

"I wish we had gotten to know each other under better circumstances," Margot said as she helped Freddie into her coat.

"Because we have a lot in common? That's what your brother said."

"He might be loathsome, but he's not always wrong."

"Do you always talk to strangers like this about your brother?"

"You aren't a stranger," Margot said. "You are part of the family now."

Freddie felt a chill. No, she refused to be part of the Verger-Graham extended dysfunctional family.

Margot stood in the drive and watched as Freddie drove away. Freddie only really relaxed when Muskrat Farm disappeared entirely from her rear-view mirror. 

Freddie drove and picked an exit at random to stop for the night. Just as she anticipated, the motel had seen better days. The lobby carpet was stained and they were still using keys on gigantic diamond-shaped fobs. After the manager handed her the key, Freddie tried to put the key in her coat pocket to have her hands free, but there was something bulky in there already. She waited until she was out from under the curious eye of the night manager before she took the object out. It was an envelope bearing the legend "Verger Meatpacking" and stuffed with hundred dollar bills.

 


	17. Circle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Freddie finally get some answers. The knowledge comes with surprises and some painful truths.

Freddie ruffled the cash, without counting it. _There is a lot of money here. S_ he could tell just from the substantial feel of the envelope. The envelope had the same "Verger Meatpacking" legend as the van did, as if this was an everyday business transaction, a wad of cash stuffed into a journalist's coat pocket.

It couldn't be as simple as a gift, could it? Maybe the meatpacking industry was like the mob and greasing palms was a knee-jerk reaction. Family gets consideration, but then what do nosy outsiders get?

Freddie tossed the money on the nightstand, as if it didn't matter. She opened her laptop and tried not to think about what strings were attached to that envelope.

She had let her work slip lately. Some of these stories were stale now, the leads long grown cold, the stories broken by others. The big file "Last Victim" was still on her desktop, the notes and manuscript of Abigail's story unfinished, untouched for weeks. Freddie pulled it up, but couldn't decide what to do and closed it out again with a sigh. It was late.

Freddie showered and got ready for bed. She had just peeled the tacky comforter off the bed when there was a gentle tap on the door. The envelope of cash was still on the nightstand. She snatched it up and stuffed it as far back in the nightstand drawer as she could, then she took her gun out of her purse. She waited for the door to smash inward, but all there was was another polite knock. She looked through the peephole. The person standing there had turned to look down the row of doors, but she recognized the back of that head, the curve of the cheek. She swore under her breath, put the chain on the door and opened it a crack.

She looked out at Will, glancing to see if there was anyone with him.

"How did you find me?" she asked.

"Mason had you followed," he said. "Can I come in?"

"No. Why is Mason having me followed?" she asked.

"Because he's paranoid."

Freddie thought about the money in the nightstand. She was feeling a little paranoid herself.

"What do you want?" she asked.

"To talk," he said. "To explain things before I leave."

"Send me an email. My contact info is on my blog."

Freddie shut the door and leaned her weight against it, as if she still thought Will was going to batter it down. Her trip to the Vergers had raised so many questions that she wanted to know the answers to, but even if she let Will in, he wouldn't enlighten her. In one of his many layers he was still a cop and didn't give up information unless he thought he was going to get something back.

He had an agenda.

She opened the door, still on the chain. Will was still standing there, leaning against the railing patiently.

"What do you want, other than to talk?" Freddie asked.

Will shrugged in a resigned _you got me gesture_. "I want you to write a story."

Freddie felt something like relief. They were back on familiar ground.

"You weren't fishing," Freddie said.

"No."

"Are you going to ask me to write something to divert the attention away from whatever you and Matthew have been up to?"

"Not _away from_. I want to direct attention _to_ what we were doing."

"Which was?"

"We got married."

 

Freddie was unbelieving, but the stunt, if it was a stunt and it had to be a stunt, was enough to make Freddie curious enough to let him in the motel room. She scoffed at Will's plain metal band—anyone could buy jewelry—but the marriage certificate was real enough. She ran her thumb over the raised notary seal and handed it back.

"That was sudden," she said.

"Not really. We've been planning this for months," he said.

 _Months_. Freddie remembered all the silent glances and the secret meeting behind locked doors. She had known something was going on, but she hadn't figured this out and she was annoyed. She didn't know if she was more annoyed at Will or herself.

"Why?" was all she could ask. "This is the stupidest thing I've heard in a long time. I would love to hear the logic behind it."

"I don't know which reason to start with," he said.

Freddie crossed her arms. "Is this the big secret plan you couldn't tell me about?"

"Its part of the big picture. The big plan is to get to Hannibal," Will said.

"Obviously," Freddie said.

 "I can't do that alone. I think…" Will stopped, unsure how to proceed. "I think that was my mistake last time. I didn't involve the right people. I wasn't methodical. But, I have learned what I need for success. I need intel. I need funds. I need moral support. And I need a PR campaign."

"The Vergers are the funds," Freddie said.

Will nodded. "I've got some money, but not enough for a manhunt spanning multiple continents," he said. "Mason is also the intel. I lost my access to all my FBI sources so I had to seek some unconventional ones. I am long past squeamishness about compromising my values. Mason knows people. The meatpacking industry is dirty. We've gotten good intel that Hannibal is in Italy. I leave tomorrow, and Matthew is already on his way."

"Sending your moral support on ahead of you" Freddie paced, crossing the room. She was replaying conversations in her head. Mason's warning to 'not pick the wrong man' took on new significance.  Mason had felt her out to see if she knew about this clandestine engagement and took obvious glee in the fact that she didn't.  "Everyone was on board with this? Mason included? He doesn't seem to be the most open-minded person I've ever met."

"Mason is a difficult person to predict," Will said. "We discussed my proclivities in an awkward heart-to-heart, the painfulness of which I can only begin to describe. He wasn't exactly happy." Will hunched forward a little changing his whole demeanor, leaning into his Mason Verger impression, his voice going reedy. "'It isn't my cup of _tea_ , but I understand the appeal. Women can be so _tiresome_ to deal with. I envy you your domestic bliss, though not the _lengths_ you have to go to achieve it." He shivered slightly, shrugging off the impression like a dog shaking off water.  "Then he thanked me for taking myself out of the genepool and not passing my inferior genetic material around 'like a virus spreading madness to unvaccinated wombs,' and then he called me a gelding. To my face, with what I assume was a smile. It sounded like a smile."

"This is your ally?"

"I don't have to like him."

"Mason is helping you…why? And don't tell me because he hates Hannibal. I want something more specific than that."

Will twisted his mouth in reluctance.

"Did Hannibal push Mason Verger into the pig pen?" Freddie asked.

"No." Will said. "It was worse than that."

"But Hannibal was responsible?"

The barest of nods from Will. "Yes."

"Do you want a drink? I have some really cheap rose' in the fridge," Freddie said. She felt a headache coming on from the sheer rush of recalculating everything she thought she knew.

"I don't drink."

"Since when?" Freddie asked, thinking of the mini-fridge back in Wolf Trap.

"Since I promised Matthew I wouldn't," he said. "But you go ahead."

Freddie took one of the little bottles out of the four-pack, unscrewed the top and took one sip, then another.

"Matthew's a good influence on you," she said.

"He's the influence I need," Will said.

Freddie looked at the level of liquid in the wine bottle skeptically. This might be a two-bottle conversation.

"I'm guessing I'm the PR," she said.

Will nodded. "I am taking a page from Hannibal's own playbook. He keeps sending me these letters to poke me, to make me react. He likes to cause chaos in my life just to watch how I respond to the wreckage.  I want to do the same thing to him. I want to be provocative. He once said…he could never fully predict what I would do. I don't think he figured on me and the man who already tried to kill him bonding over our mutual love of wanting to see him dead."

"This won't just draw Hannibal Lecter's attention," Freddie said. "If the FBI weren't looking to arrest you before, they will be now. I thought you were lying low."

"And waiting for this to blow over? Multiple murders? We've been lucky so far. The FBI has been distracted. Once leads on Hannibal dry up, they are going to be looking closer to home. The media hasn't been kind to them." He looked at Freddie with mild reproach. It didn't bother her. She hadn't felt the need to be kind to the FBI when they screwed up." They need arrests. They waited just long enough for people to stop feeling sorry for me. They can't give the public Hannibal, but they can haul me out of my home another fucking time. My house has been rifled through by the FBI so often I should give them their own monogrammed towels."

"Why not just ask me to plant a story?" she asked. "You know I'm not above bending the truth."

"For one thing, Hannibal would know. It has to be real."

"This marriage isn't real," Freddie said. "You have the paperwork on it and in the eyes of the law it's legal and binding, but it’s a sham."

Will held up a finger. "It's not a sham. It will work because it's true. I love Matthew. We want the same things in life. We share the same goals and outlook. Shared values are a very good predictor of a relationship's success."

"This relationship is not going to be a success!" Freddie said. "You can't build a healthy relationship on this foundation."

"What do you know about the foundations of a healthy relationship?" he said. Then he leaned back a little on his heels. "We vowed until death do us part," he said gravely. "I think we'll make it that far."

Will wasn't talking about reaching his golden years with Matthew. Freddie felt a strange deja vu. She and Will had started their relationship in a hotel room talking about Will not surviving Hannibal and now they were ending their relationship the same way. Everything came full circle.

"I owe Matthew commitment," Will said. "He already committed to me. He meant those vows. Those words were just formalizing what he already felt."

"What about you?"                                                                

"I have good intentions," he said.

Freddie sat down at the rickety table with a deep sigh.

"Hannibal will know anyway," Freddie said. "He will know you are doing this to provoke him and he won't rise to it."

Will sat down at the small table across from her. "That's where your article comes in. Anyone can throw down the facts, but you can convince him. He won't be able to resist."

Freddie looked doubtful.

"You wrote about Abel Gideon being the Chesapeake Ripper and what happened?" Will asked. "Hannibal couldn't help himself. It will work. There's layers to this. Its very credible. First layer: quirky love story. Quotes from me and Matthew will about things like love overcoming adversity and Matthew being so afraid that he almost lost me, you know. Our love blossoming like a fragile prison-yard flower, romantic bullshit like that. That's our side of the story.  Second layer: you add in the things you got from your source, Damon Perry."

"Our source who is actually a cop and made up those things?"

"No one can fault you if you take the information on face value. You have it from a reliable anonymous source that we are going to be arrested. Hint that we got married for spousal immunity…"

"Total bullshit. Untested on the federal level. You are facing federal charges."

"Our lawyers are willing to fight that to the Supreme Court," Will said.

"Lawyers paid for by Margot Verger. Oh, I bet they are."

"Third layer—"

Freddie cut him off. "-- third layer: underneath that legal stuff, the hint, just the barest hint of the impropriety of the relationship. Considering you two met while you were a patient at a mental institution when Matthew worked there, there is an ethical question to consider."

Will was smiling. Despite herself Freddie was getting into it..

"You sure have a habit of getting entangled with your mental health care providers," Freddie said. "But what about Frederick?  Any implication of impropriety at BSHCI is going to reflect badly on him."

Freddie could tell Will hadn't even considered the fall out to Frederick.

"See," he said finally. "This is exactly why I can't trust this to anyone else. You have to do this. Your version will set the tone.  It's only a matter of time before someone else digs up this marriage  license, and do you think they are going to care about Frederick Chilton's reputation? The media is all too happy to kick a man when he's down."

"I'll do it," she said. Will started to thank her but Freddie held up her hand. "I'll write what you want, if you tell me who killed Alana Bloom."

All the light went out of Will's eyes.

 "Hannibal," he said. "Of course it was Hannibal. Why would there be any question?"

Freddie reached over to her bag was hanging over the back of the chair. She took out the letter she had gotten from Hannibal. She read a portion out loud. She did not like the sound of his words coming from her mouth and her voice was stilted. " I want to be crystal clear on the subject. I did not kill Alana Bloom. I deny all responsibility for her fatal fall. While we are on the subject, I also deny killing my former patient Randall Tier and the unfortunate bailiff Andrew Sykes. As for anyone else, make of their omission what you will."  Freddie folded the letter with finality.

"Let me see that," Will said, holding his hand out, eyes narrowed.

"There are other things in it," she said.

"What could he have to say that I don't already know?"

_I knew you were alive all along._

"You didn't share your letters with me," she said, putting the letter back in her bag.  "Why would Hannibal lie about this? Why bother denying killing Alana?"

"Maybe he's lying because he regrets what he did."

"That's not like him."

"No it isn't," Will said "but there was no one else there."

"No one?" Freddie asked.

" _I_ didn't do it, if that's what you are implying. Whatever happened with Alana happened before I arrived. She was already hurt when I got there."

"You can find out," she said. "Do it. Profile the killing of Alana Bloom and I will write whatever story you want."

"You don't really want me to do that. There were three people in that house when Alana was pushed. She didn't jump or fall, and if Hannibal didn't do it…"

Will was already half back in the house mentally, but he needed a little nudge. Freddie opened her laptop and in a few keystrokes she had the right file open. Crime scene pictures. Nothing from the kitchen, those were in a separate file, but everything relating to Alana.

 Freddie turned the screen around so Will could see it. After a moment, he pulled the laptop closer, clicked through the pictures: knives on a downstairs table, a door riddled with bullet holes, glass broken and jagged in a window frame, blood and glass and rainwater by the front door. His breath was coming fast. He closed his eyes, put his hands palm down on the table. He moved his head slightly, seeing something behind his closed eyes.

"She was in the shadows…" he said."Alana…let her guard down. She was so surprised. She didn't see the threat, she didn't raise her gun…" Will brought his hands off the table, his palms forward. Freddie thought it was the signal of someone helpless at gunpoint, but then he made a small forward motion and she realized it was not a passive pose. He was miming the push. In his mind he had done it.

Will hands curled into fists." It was Abigail." He opened his eyes, pulled his arms in and crossed them. He spoke through gritted teeth. "Abigail pushed Alana. As hard as she could."

"But why?"

Will shook his head. "I don't think we'll ever know for sure. Abigail was alone for months with Hannibal. Already very vulnerable and traumatized. Look what he did to Miriam Lass, a trained FBI agent. Abigail didn't stand a chance."

Freddie closed her laptop, hiding the pictures from view again.

"I told you you weren't going to like the answer," Will said.

"You already knew it was Abigail."

"I had my suspicions," he said. "I was avoiding pursuing them until now. You aren't going to write about this are you?"

"No," Freddie said.  "Just…please tell me this is going to be over. No mercy. If my story makes Hannibal Lecter poke his head out, I want to be damn sure you are going to cut it off."

"I have failed twice at hooking this fish. Its time to dynamite the whole fucking lake."

 

They hovered over the keyboard together. Freddie didn't usually like to collaborate with anyone but working together they shaped the story, using their words to bring some facts to the forefront and let other things fade in importance. Unsurprisingly, Will displayed a real knack for spinning a story-- teasing out fine shades of meaning, picking out the right word that would imply without outright stating.  They sketched out an outline, giving it the right form and making some plans for how to handle what might come up in the future.

Freddie splashed up the headline. "The Groom Wore Stripes: Former Slaying Suspect Weds Jailer."

"Do you have any pictures of the two of you together?" Freddie asked.  "Otherwise it just a block of text."

Will sent Freddie a picture on his phone that someone had taken of him and Matthew at the courthouse. Will was wearing the blue shirt Freddie had noticed was missing from his closet. Matthew was wearing the khakis and white button-down he had on the day he was released from prison.

Freddie used that picture and pulled up another from her files to use to illustrate the story. "Tell me," she said, "if you think this goes too far." She popped the second picture into the layout.

It was one she had taken outside of the Beverly Katz crime scene. Will was in a straitjacket and masked. She had chosen the one that best showed the orderly pushing the dolly. It was clearly the same man holding Will's hand and grinning on the courthouse steps.

Will didn't speak for a moment. "I hardly recognize myself," he finally said in a far-off voice. "I can't believe that's me. Being in prison was like an out-of-body experience most of the time. I was never really there. I forget how real it was to everyone else." He took his eyes off the screen and when he spoke again he was businesslike. "The picture is perfect. It goes right for the jugular. If Hannibal had any doubts about you going easy on me, I think this would persuade him."

"So. Good job," she said, without conviction. She had a small sick feeling she was trying to ignore.

"I should go," Will said, standing. "I have a few things to do yet."

"You don't have to worry about the dogs. I brought them to Margot," Freddie said.

"I know," Will said. "That was the signal to Mason and Margot that Matthew and I were putting the plan in motion. I didn't want to risk a phone call if I didn't have to."

"You son-of-a-bitch," she said, with an appreciative smile. "Not only did you have me watch your dogs while you went on your honeymoon, you used me to relay a secret message without my knowledge. Hats off to you, Mr. Graham."

He looked serious. "I don't take any pleasure in having deceived you."

"Liar," she said.

"I told you that you would survive us all," he said. "I was just trying to help that along."

Freddie walked Will to the door. It was only a few steps but it felt formal. She was ushering him out of her life and into the realm of memories. He would be her past.

"I'm not going to ask you to stay," she said. "Although you could, if you wanted to."

Will shook his head ruefully. "I'm forsaking all others," he said. "I promised."

He gave her one last kiss at the door. It was the goodbye forever kiss she expected back at the house, delivered now when she didn't really want it.

"What now?"

"I go," he said simply. "I go and I don't look back."

She didn't ask if she would see him again. If she ever did—and that was by no means sure—they would be different people. He would be on the other side of whatever crucible he was passing through. She didn't know what she was going to be like. She could hardly remember the Freddie that existed before Will and Hannibal, before Abigail Hobbs. Going back was impossible. Even dead, these people would be rooted in her heart just by the strength of her love or hate.

Will walked down the motel's concrete walkway, and Freddie watched from the open motel room doorway. She watched him descend the metal staircase. He walked down and crossed the parking lot in brisk determined strides. True to his word, he didn't look back.


	18. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A little bit of the ol' Happily Ever After.

Freddie rose earlier than she might have liked. She had a few things to do and a narrow window of time to do them in. She wished she could just slide into a taxi's backseat, her eyes unreadable behind the round lenses of her sunglasses and be whisked away, but she had her car to worry about and errands to run. She had to drive herself.

That didn't mean she wasn't going to take time to look good. A red and black leopard-print miniskirt--toned down and made travel-friendly with black tights and sturdy boots with a manageable heel. Jacket in oxblood buttery-smooth leather, over a black-on-black lace shell. She didn't know where she was going to end up, but looking good was always a positive tactical decision.

Freddie was used to traveling and could fit a lot in her small valise. Whatever didn't fit she could replace. She had the money.

She couldn't keep all of this cash on hand, though. She drove to her bank, watching in her rear-view mirror to see if she was being followed. Either she wasn't, or her tail was very good. Mason would probably hire people who were very good.

It was still early, and the streets were empty, the morning light still gray. Freddie didn't like how exposed she felt walking from her car to the bank's night drop box. She deposited half of the Verger's $20,000 gift into her account.

She broke a $100 bill at a Wal-mart buying a few magazines. The cashier sighed heavily as she held the bill up the light, swiped it with the fraud-detecting marker and then begrudgingly fished out enough change. That left Freddie with $9,975.60. Just slightly less than what would have to have been legally declared at airport customs.

Freddie was cutting it close to flight time. She parked her car in the long-term lot and went inside. She had enough time to get through security, if the line wasn't too long. While she waited in line, she made the final keystrokes to go public with Will's story. She had wanted to give him time to get out of American airspace before the news hit. By now, Will was safely on his way to meet Matthew over in Italy. The last part of their well-oiled revenge machine was set into motion.

Freddie almost wished she could see Kade Prurnell's face when she read the article. Some poor underling was going to have to break the news to her, woe be to them. If they were smart they would send an email and hide the rest of the day.

 Prurnell had been a constant problem for Freddie. She had refused to play the game as Jack Crawford knew it had to be played.  Freddie might not have always liked the way Crawford played, but at least he joined in. Prurnell refused to even engage. Her self-righteousness was tiresome.

Not unconscious of the appreciative glances she left in her wake, Freddie  got through security with minimal fuss and went down to her gate. Although Frederick was looking out for her, she saw him first and enjoyed the look of relief on his face when he finally spotted her.  

"You made it," he said, unnecessarily. He kissed her on both cheeks.

"I told you I was coming."

"I wasn't sure you were going to make it in time." He frowned. "You cut it close. They are going to board in a few minutes. You could have saved time if you had just thrown on some blue jeans and a ball cap instead of going for flash."

Freddie supposed Frederick was trying to be low-key, ditching his usual suit. But if he was trying to go unnoticed it didn't work.  The polo-and-khaki casual look he had been going for had been completely undermined by the severe eyepatch and ever-present cane.

Freddie looked up at the board by the gangway entrance.

"Tokyo?"

"To start with," Frederick said, beaming. "I have an itinerary. After Japan its New Zealand and Australia. Just about as far from Baltimore you can get without launching into orbit. I don't guess Hannibal is doing a walkabout in the Outback."

"Probably not, since he's in Italy."

"A lucky guess?"

"I have it from a reliable source," she said.

Frederick looked at her more closely. He had gotten into the habit of tilting his head slightly to look straight on with his good eye. Depending on the angle of his eyebrow and the crook of his mouth, it made him look bashful, inquisitive or mischievous. Now he looked concerned. He looked like he was listening. Strange that he never looked as open to hearing what someone had to say when he was a psychiatrist and was supposed to listen to people for a living.

"So," he said. "I didn't want to ask over the phone last night, but what did he do?"

Freddie had been so definite in the weeks and months she lived at Wolf Trap. She was staying with the story. She was staying with Will. And then last night, she called and asked if it was still too late to go on that vacation. Frederick had been pleasantly surprised. He had been hoping up until the last minute that she would change her mind. He didn't ask any questions then, but after he hung up the phone he had been flooded with worry. He was glad to have Freddie with him, but he was afraid to hear her answer.

Frederick barely controlled the tremor in his voice.  "What finally made you give up on Will Graham?"

What answer could she give? The fewer people who knew that Will and Matthew were on a murder mission, the better.   _Someday,_ she thought, _when this is all in the distant past, I'll tell him the truth_. Right now there was an easy answer, a disingenuous answer.

"Have you checked TattleCrime lately?" she said with a lightness she didn't feel.

"I peeked at it this morning before leaving the house. It hasn't been very active lately."

"I posted something new."

Frederick took out his tablet and went over to Freddie's site. He read, and then smiled.

"That's very amusing. 'The Groom Wore Stripes' "

"I don't think its funny," Freddie replied, deadpan.

"This isn't a joke," Frederick said after a few moments of silence, then shook his head decisively.  "They have to be running a scam on you. I have to say, I've seen more graceful ways to bow out of a relationship. But nothing Will Graham could do would surprise me anymore."

"I saw the marriage certificate myself," she said. "By the power vested in the great state of North Carolina-- love, honor etc."

Freddie kept her face carefully blank and observed Frederick's dawning horror.

"Wait," he said. "If this is real…" Freddie nodded her encouragement. "Were they…how long has this been going on, Freddie?  Did they—" Frederick leaned in and lowered his voice. "Did they screw around in my institution?" His words tripped over themselves as new thoughts came to him. "Matthew was on the night shift...he preferred the night shift. At the time I was grateful but...and the cameras were always going out…who knows what they were up to…under my very nose...I sent Matthew to watch Will in the _shower_!"

Of course Frederick's mind would go right to what this meant to him. Freddie almost felt bad for letting him leap to conclusions.

"Will says nothing happened while he was under your care," She said finally. "I asked. It was more of a subtle flirtatious thing back then. Lingering glances through the bars of his cage, a tender touch when taking off handcuffs, and extra dinner roll at slop time. Basic romantic overtures."

"Please don't joke. I'm on thin ice with the board as it is. I might never get my job back if there is one more hint of impropriety. Orderlies and inmates carrying on is very improper."

"Is it unethical?"

The announcement that their flight was boarding interrupted them.

"Don't worry about it," she said, taking the tablet from Frederick. "We need to turn this off, for the flight."

She took a last look at the article, then slipped the tablet into her bag and started walking. Frederick walked fast to catch up.

"But seriously, Freddie, did they screw in my institution?"

It would take halfway to Tokyo for Freddie to convince him.

**Author's Note:**

> (Written as part of the Hannibal Summer of Rare Pairings)
> 
> Chapter 1 is during the events of Mizumono. Chapter 2 and following is post-Mizumono


End file.
